The House of Representatives gave approval Sept. 22 for a 10-year renewal of the Caribbean Basin Trade Partnership Act. For it to stay in force beyond its expiration date, Sept. 30, the Senate will have to follow suit with a unanimous consent process (see 2009210048).
The Caribbean Basin Trade Partnership Act has been placed on the voting calendar, and is likely to get a vote on Sept. 23, as it is the first in a second-day list of “suspension bills” under consideration. The first slate of suspension bills will have votes on Sept. 22, if anyone calls for a recorded vote on Sept. 21. Suspension bills can also progress without recorded votes. For suspension bills, floor debate is limited, amendments are prohibited, and a two-thirds vote is required for passage. Only non-controversial bills are submitted this way.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and his fellow New York colleague, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, sent a letter to U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and the Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue, urging them to monitor the elimination of Class 6 and Class 7 pricing programs in Canadian dairy, the avoidance of geographical indications for cheese names in Mexico, and the implementation of more generous tariff rate quotas for dairy imports in Canada. “While the new tariff-rate quota commitments were intended to provide U.S. dairy producers with greater access to Canada’s dairy market, it is our understanding that Canada’s announced TRQs place U.S. producers at a disadvantage and are inconsistent with the market access provisions secured in agreement,” they wrote Sept. 15.
A baker's dozen Republican senators, led by Sen. Mike Lee of Utah, praised recent withhold release orders on Xinjiang goods (see 2009140017), and urged CBP to continue investigating the region, in a letter dated Sept. 17. They said reports of re-education camps there are particularly alarming. “There is significant, publicly available evidence suggesting that religious and ethnic minority citizens in Xinjiang are being forcibly detained, indoctrinated, and conscripted into labor against their will. Most recently, according to media reports, Uyghurs have been forcibly transported to work in factories in COVID-19 infected areas to keep supply chains running,” they wrote. Also signing were Sens. Roy Blunt of Missouri; Mike Braun of Indiana; Rick Scott of Florida; John Barrasso of Wyoming; Mike Rounds of South Dakota; John Thune of South Dakota; Thom Tillis of North Carolina; Martha McSally of Arizona; Roger Wicker of Mississippi; Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma; John Hoeven of North Dakota; and John Cornyn of Texas.
The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, is arguing that not only does the Generalized System of Preferences benefits program need to be renewed this year, the length of authorization should be substantially lengthened. It is currently on a two-year authorization; Heritage says 10 years would make it more useful to American businesses that take advantage of the tariff relief, as making supply chain decisions takes time.
The new lobbyist for the National Customs Brokers & Forwarders Association of America encouraged members to keep calling their elected representatives' offices to ask them to support a bill that would change clawback rules in the case of business bankruptcies. Currently, money paid to customs brokers in the 90 days before a bankruptcy filing is clawed back from those firms, even if the money was passed through to CBP for duty payments. CBP does not return the duties in this process, so a customs broker is on the hook for it, and has to get in line with other creditors for a partial payment.
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and his colleague Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, sent a letter to Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross asking him to bypass the normal exclusion process and lift the 25% tariffs on steel that will be used to rebuild grain bins, machine sheds, or other construction projects in Iowa, and to remove the tariff for agricultural machinery manufacturers. They said that farmers who need to replace grain bins or other buildings with steel infrastructure are being gouged by “opportunists” after sustaining damage from a powerful wind storm Aug. 10, and that they don't have time to wait through the several months' process of applying for an exclusion. They said that the high prices being quoted are proof that there isn't enough domestic supply, and they believe allowing imports at market prices would curb abuses by domestic sellers. “Your staff has often said that one reason they need broad authority under the current Section 232 law is to have the flexibility in case of an emergency. Well, there’s clearly one now. We, and other Members of Congress, will be watching your response closely. We expect you to rise to the task,” they wrote.
Four Senate Democrats, led by Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, say they support proposed rules from the Federal Trade Commission to require online and email assertions that products were made in the U.S. to follow the same standards as labels on the products themselves (see 2006230049). Brown, Sen. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., and Connecticut's two senators -- Chris Murphy and Richard Blumenthal -- wrote in comments to the FTC: “We have long pushed the Commission to utilize all of its existing authority to establish and enforce Made in USA standards, and we strongly support the Commission’s initiation of a [notice of proposed rulemaking] process. We ask that any final rule and its implementation cover all online Made in USA claims, as well as physical labels, and emphasize the Commission’s authority to apply civil penalties to violators.”
The House Ways and Means Trade Subcommittee will hold a hearing via videoconference at noon on Sept. 17 on “Enforcing the Ban on Imports Produced by Forced Labor in Xinjiang.” An announcement from the administration on the topic is reported to be coming (see 2009090053).
The AGOA Action Coalition told the House Ways and Means Committee that it is staunchly against allowing apparel and textiles to be covered for all Generalized System of Preferences benefits program countries. The group, which publicized its Sept. 3 letter, argued that all the African clothing production nurtured by the duty-free access under the African Growth and Opportunity Act would be put out of business if Pakistan, Cambodia, Indonesia and the Philippines are granted duty-free access in apparel, as “margin-hungry sourcing managers” would choose these more competitive factories. They noted that AGOA participant country textile exports were $1.4 billion, compared with $4.9 billion from Indonesia.