The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative will seek comment on whether to increase tariffs on the products already targeted in the Airbus dispute or add other EU products to the list, the agency said in a notice. USTR also seeks input on whether any EU products currently being tariffed should be removed. The comments are due Jan. 13, 2020.
Tim Warren
Timothy Warren is Executive Managing Editor of Communications Daily. He previously led the International Trade Today editorial team from the time it was purchased by Warren Communications News in 2012 through the launch of Export Compliance Daily and Trade Law Daily. Tim is a 2005 graduate of the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts and lives in Maryland with his wife and three kids.
CBP is working to resolve an issue with some product exclusions for the Section 232 tariffs on aluminum that are being rejected mistakenly, a CBP official said during a Dec. 5 call with software developers. CBP plans “to have a remedy next week” but “because they are retroactive, if you must pay the duty because the system is apparently rejecting them, you always have [the Post Summary Correction (PSC)] process,” she said. The importer may also choose to delay entry, she said.
CBP added on Dec. 5 the ability in ACE for importers to file entries with recently excluded goods in the third tranche of Section 301 tariffs, it said in a CSMS message. Filers of imported products that were granted an exclusion (see 1911260056) should report the regular Chapters 17, 28, 39, 68, 69, 73, 83, 84, 85, 87, 89 and 94 Harmonized Tariff Schedule number, as well as subheading 9903.88.35, CBP said in the message. “Importers shall not submit the corresponding Chapter 99 HTS number for the Section 301 duties when” subheading 9903.88.35 is submitted, CBP said.
Recently proposed additional Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism Minimum Security Criteria for ocean carriers beyond the previously planned changes for 2020 are raising some concern, said Michael Young, vice president of Business Process and System at shipping company OOCL, during the Dec. 4 Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee meeting. Young, who is on the COAC, said during the meeting that there were seven minimum security criteria recently added for ocean carriers. CBP “did propose additional MSC in light of the recent smuggling issues that happened” as a way “to address the situation that occurred in those high-profile cases,” Young said in an email after the meeting. He declined to go into specifics because the proposal is still under discussion.
Goods imported by members of the Yakama tribe from Canada are not exempt from customs duties despite an 1855 treaty between the U.S. and the Yakama Nation of Native Americans, CBP said in a Nov. 12 ruling. JC Company requested that CBP issue a binding ruling on whether that treaty “exempts the Yakamas from payment of customs duties on merchandise when they import into Washington State by ground from Canada.” As part of the request, the company pointed to a Supreme Court decision this year that affirmed that the “right to travel” provision of the treaty pre-empted a conflicting state law that involved importing fuel from Oregon to Washington state.
International Trade Today is providing readers with some of the top stories for Nov. 25-29 in case they were missed.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative concluded in its Trade Act Section 301 investigative report released the evening of Dec. 2 (see 1912020066) that France’s digital services tax (DST), enacted into law in July, discriminates against U.S. companies, tech and business trade associations said. USTR seeks comment by Jan. 6, 2020, in docket USTR-2019-0009 at regulations.gov on its proposal to slap up to 100 percent retaliatory tariffs on 63 subheadings of French imports worth about $2.4 billion in 2018 customs value, mainly cheese, beauty products, handbags and kitchenware. The French government didn’t comment.
A new working group within the Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee (COAC) is reviewing the risks and benefits around remote and autonomous cargo processing, according to a CBP issue paper released ahead of the Dec. 4 COAC meeting. “Drones, driverless vehicles, captainless ships -- autonomous delivery is already operating within borders to deliver goods to customers,” it said in the paper. The government should examine the risks and opportunities created by the technologies, CBP said. “As CBP embarks on autonomous processes and conditions, it needs to realize impacts and benefits to industry.”
The Commerce Department is proposing new procedures for how to review transactions, including imports, that involve information and communications technology and services (ICTS) and are seen as a potential threat, it said in Nov. 26 news release. The proposal is result of a May executive order that directed Commerce to lead the way in developing oversight of such transactions (see 1905160019). Commerce proposes to use “a case-by-case, fact-specific approach to determine those transactions that meet the requirements” described in the executive order.
The Office of the U.S Trade Representative issued some new product exclusions from Section 301 tariffs on the third list of products from China, according to a pre-publication copy of a notice posted to the agency’s website Nov. 26. The product exclusions apply retroactively to Sept. 24, 2018, the date the tariffs on the third list took effect, and will remain in effect until Aug. 7, 2020. New subheading 9903.88.35 will be used for these products.