Members of the Senate Finance Committee and the House Ways and Means Committee who spoke at the first meeting of that conference committee to find a compromise China competition package sounded more combative than cooperative.
The Biden administration's approach to changing Section 301 tariffs is "a work in progress," said Sarah Bianchi, a deputy U.S. trade representative, while at a May 11 National Council of Textile Organizations conference. Her comments, which avoided directly answering a question of whether the administration position is that tariffs on apparel are not strategic, came a day after President Joe Biden told reporters that administration officials are discussing whether any Section 301 tariffs should be lowered or removed, "and no decision has been made on it."
CBP is ready for the June start date of the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, John Leonard, deputy executive assistant commissioner of the CBP Office of Trade told a textile conference audience. However, Leonard acknowledged that CBP won't have identified factories outside of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region that employ Uyghurs or members of other persecuted groups by the start of enforcement. Those goods are also supposed to be blocked under the UFLPA.
The Commerce Department terminated the antidumping investigation on imports of emulsion styrene butadiene rubber from Italy (A-475-844), after the petitioner, Lion Elastomers LLC, withdrew its antidumping duty petition.
The top Republican on the House Ways and Means Committee, who will be one of the negotiators for the compromise China package, expressed pessimism that a version of the bill can be found that can get a majority vote in both the House and Senate. The Senate passed its version, the U.S. Innovation and Competition Act, with 67 votes; the House version, known as the Competes Act, only had one Republican on board.
With negotiations expected to begin in earnest soon on the House and Senate's trade packages, staffers in both chambers of Congress say there could be support for antidumping and countervailing duty reform and language around Section 301 tariff exclusions, but the likelihood of a dramatic de minimis change seems somewhat remote.
A wide variety of trade groups told the Commerce Department that while they know the administration doesn't intend to tackle tariffs as part of its negotiations with Asian countries, they think offering to lower tariffs on U.S. goods would be the best way to get ambitious commitments in the region, and many said reconsidering the re-named Trans-Pacific Partnership is better than the conceived Indo-Pacific Economic Framework.
Academics and human rights organization employees are concerned about trade groups' requests at a public hearing on the implementation of the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act.
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., said it would be good if the House and Senate could name their respective conferees to the committee that will aim to hash out a compromise between the two chambers' China packages. He said the next two weeks, when Congress will not be in Washington, could be put to good use by the members. But Hoyer suggested the House will wait until the Senate passes its motion to go to conference, and gives its negotiating instructions.
CBP aims to start development of “ACE 2.0” in 2025, building off the work going into CBP’s 21st Century Customs Framework (21CCF) and the legislative framework that emerges from that effort, said Gail Kan, CBP acting executive director for trade policy and programs, during a meeting of the Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee March 31.