Best Buy to Urge USTR to Drop TVs From List of Goods Targeted for Chinese Tariffs

Best Buy wants to testify at the May 15 hearing on the Trump administration’s proposed 25 percent tariffs on goods imported from China (see 1804050005), the company said in a written “request to appear” filed Friday with U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and posted Tuesday in docket USTR-2018-0005. At the hearing and in written comments Best Buy will submit by the May 11 deadline, Chief Marketing Officer Mike Mohan will urge the USTR to eliminate from the list of targeted products flat-panel TVs under the 85287264 subheading of the Harmonized Tariff Schedule, said the filing. “Best Buy intends to provide testimony on the inefficacy of the proposed tariffs in achieving the objectives outlined by USTR,” the impact tariffs will have on Best Buy, the industry and U.S. consumers, “and alternative remedies that USTR should consider instead of the tariffs,” it said. Analysts estimate TVs classified under the 85287264 subheading include virtually all the sets that are imported from China, including Best Buy’s Insignia-brand private-label product (see 1804040023). Nearly 19 million TVs with a value of $3.9 billion were imported from China in 2017 under the 85287264 classification last year. No CTA comments or requests to appear at the heating were posted in the docket by our Tuesday deadline, but Bronwyn Flores, CTA specialist-policy communications, wrote Monday on her own behalf, without mentioning her CTA affiliation. She asked the USTR “to stand up for free trade and oppose tariffs on imported Chinese goods.” If the proposed tariffs go through, “American consumers can expect to pay up to $100 more on TVs from China,” she said. “Tariffs also put at risk the 7 million American jobs that are tied to trade with China.”