For more information on pursuing trade policy interests through the legislative process, please contact Nicole Bivens Collinson at (202) 730-4956 or via email.
CBP. The House of Representatives approved Jan. 18 H.R. 5862, which would create a global trade specialist position within U.S. Customs and Border Protection “to ensure the agency is responding faster to combat trade cheats like China who try to exert an unfair economic advantage over American workers and undermine America’s trade laws.”
Tariffs. The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee voted Jan. 18 to advance the Providing Reliable, Objective, Verifiable Emissions Intensity and Transparency Act (S. 1863), which would direct the Department of Energy to study and report on the greenhouse gas emissions released during the production of various commodities in the U.S. and other countries. A Politico article notes that this study “could help pave the way to impose carbon tariffs” on imported goods if it shows “U.S. companies’ relative carbon advantage.”
A bipartisan group of lawmakers wrote to U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai Jan. 17 to encourage her to make renewal of the World Trade Organization’s moratorium on customs duties on electronic transmissions a top priority at the upcoming WTO ministerial conference. The moratorium, which covers electronic transmissions of both digital goods (music, movies, video games, etc.) and services (software, emails, etc.) has been in place since 1998 and was most recently extended in June 2022. The lawmakers said that if the moratorium is not renewed “governments around the world would be free to impose tariffs and other trade barriers on numerous American industries that transmit products and services electronically and rely heavily on the free flow of data around the globe, including manufacturing, agriculture, entertainment, software, financial services, semiconductors, aerospace, autos, robotics, and medical devices.”
GSP. The Digital Trade for Development Act (H.R. 6990, introduced Jan. 12 by Rep. LaHood, R-Ill.) would incorporate digital trade policies as a statutory consideration in designating beneficiary developing countries under the Generalized System of Preferences.
MTB. The National Association of Manufacturers wrote to House Ways and Means Committee leaders Jan. 16 asking them to include the miscellaneous trade bill in the next committee markup of trade legislation. The MTB temporarily reduces or eliminates import tariffs on products not available in the U.S. and has been expired since December 2020. Last fall dozens of trade organizations urged that the MTB be renewed through 2026 with full retroactivity.
Imports. A bipartisan group of senators recently wrote to the Department of Commerce to express concern about its decision to withdraw a proposed regulation that would have expanded the Seafood Import Monitoring Program. Citing an International Trade Commission study finding that the U.S. imported more than $2.4 billion worth of illegal seafood in 2019, the senators encouraged the DOC “to use this opportunity to implement a stronger, more comprehensive and transparent rulemaking process and rule” that expands the SIMP, includes forced labor as a criterion for including species in the program, and makes other changes.
China. S. 3590 (introduced Jan. 16 by Sen. Scott, R-Fla.) would prohibit the importation of garlic from China. Scott’s office said there have been reports that Chinese garlic “is grown in raw human sewage, then bleached and harvested in abhorrent conditions, often with slave labor.”
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