Bipartisan House, Senate Bills Would Require List 3 Section 301 Tariff-Exclusion Process

The National Retail Federation hailed introduction Thursday of bipartisan legislation in the House and Senate requiring the Trump administration to begin an exclusion-request process for the third tranche of 10 percent Section 301 tariffs on Chinese imports modeled after those in the first two rounds of duties. The legislation, sponsored by Sens. James Lankford, R-Okla., and Chris Coons, D-Del., and Reps. Ron Kind, D-Wis., and Jackie Walorski, R-Ind., would require granting tariff exclusions for imports “that have no commercial availability outside of China,” or those “for which a tariff would cause an increase in consumer prices for low- and middle-income families,” said NRF. Tariffs are “taking a toll on hardworking Americans across the country,” said David French, NRF senior vice president-government relations. “Establishing a timely and efficient tariff exclusion process is the least Washington can do for American businesses that have no alternative supplier and for working families that rely on everyday products.” Walorski, one of the bill’s House sponsors, questioned U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer at a Ways and Means Committee hearing about whether he expected to meet the 30-day deadline for initiating a List 3 tariff-exclusion process under a mandate written into the Feb. 15 omnibus spending bill.(see 1902270047). “It’s something that we’re looking at,” he said, as if the mandate didn’t exist. Lighthizer said he will maintain the policy of initiating a List 3 exclusion process if the tariffs increases to 25 percent. Under the legislation, the granted exclusions would be retroactive to List 3's Sept. 24 effective date. In specifying the terms under which exclusions would be required, the legislation also would also take away USTR's discretion to grant exemptions under conditions the agency hasn't specified for rounds one and two. The legislation's sponsors cited the Congressional Research Service in saying that U.S. importers paid more than $12.2 billion in tariffs for all three Section 301 lists through Feb. 21.