Sen. Portman Says Ending Normal Trade Relations Status for Russia Should Be Considered

Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, said he is interested in revoking Permanent Normal Trading Relations with Russia over the weekend. "The US must respond forcefully & consider the unprecedented nature of the crisis," he tweeted. "Everything should be on the table -- including revoking Permanent Normal Trading Relations w/ Russia. Access to the US market is a privilege, not a right."

Last week, House Ways and Means Trade Subcommittee Chairman Earl Blumenauer, D-Ore., co-sponsored a bill to revoke PNTR and to ask the U.S. delegation to the World Trade Organization to rally opinion there to expel Russia from the WTO (see 2202250020).

Georgetown University Professor Jennifer Hillman said in a Feb. 28 email that Blumenauer and his co-sponsor Rep. Lloyd Doggett, D-Texas, "are right that if you want to increase the tariffs on all imports from Russia, the easiest way to do so is to take away MFN or PNTR from Russia. This would mean Russian goods would pay Column 2 (much higher) tariff rates on all imports to the U.S.," she said, and making that change must come from Congress.

She said the impact of taking away PNTR would be "somewhat limited, given the somewhat limited US imports of Russian goods totaled just under $30 billion last year. And Russian retaliation against US exports would be even more limited, as our exports to Russia were only $5.5 billion."

While that would violate WTO obligations, she said it would be easily justified under Article XXI of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, the WTO precursor. That article says the commitments can be broken if "taken in a time of war or other emergency in international relations." There is no procedure to kick a country out of the WTO, she said. "However, as the bill suggests, if many more countries just raise their tariffs on Russian exports, then Russia has lost one of the major benefits of being a WTO member."