Second NC Lawmaker Backs Cree's Call to Remove LEDs From Tariffs List

A second House member from North Carolina went to bat for Cree in the company’s attempt to fend off Trade Act Section 301 tariffs on U.S. imports of LEDs from China. The company produces LED wafers at its plant in Durham, North Carolina, exports them to China for making them into finished packaged chips and re-imports those chips to the U.S., said Rep. David Price, D-N.C., in a June 8 letter to U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer posted Wednesday in docket USTR-2018-0005. Cree began exporting the wafers 11 years ago to a plant it owns in Huizhou so it could “serve the rapidly growing and large Chinese and Asian markets,” said Price, who said 2,500 Cree employees work in his congressional district in Durham. Unless the USTR’s office removes from the tariffs list LEDs classified under the Harmonized Tariffs Schedule subheading 85414020, Cree would be forced to pay 25 percent higher duties on the devices, “despite the fact that approximately 70 percent of the value of these LED chips and components are based on U.S. intellectual property,” Price said. Including those LEDs on the final tariffs list “erroneously entangles the company into tariff proposals that are unlikely to result in a reduction of unfair IP practices in China,” he said. Rep. George Holding, R-N.C., earlier urged Lighthizer to remove Chinese LED imports from the final tariffs list (see 1806100001). The White House announced May 29 that the USTR’s office will release its final tariffs list by Friday and the tariffs will take effect “shortly thereafter” (see 1805290046).