The top Republican on the House Ways and Means Committee supports extending Trade Act Section 301 tariff exclusions on Chinese imports automatically instead of through burdensome notice and comment proceedings, he told reporters Wednesday. The Trump administration should alleviate “the energy and effort that businesses have to undertake to extend these exclusions right now when they frankly have bigger fish to fry,” said Rep. Kevin Brady, R-Texas. He said he expressed his views to U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross. Brady supports bipartisan legislation sponsored by fellow Ways and Means member Rep. Jackie Walorski, R-Ind., and House Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson, D-Minn., that would direct USTR to extend expiring exclusions for at least a year, but would give the agency some discretion when it disagrees (see 2007170050). U.S. businesses should be “focused on surviving” the COVID-19 pandemic and keeping people employed instead of scrambling to find non-Chinese sourcing or arguing for an exclusion extension, Brady said. USTR and Commerce didn’t comment Thursday.

The retail, fashion, footwear and apparel industries represent “thousands of brands,” and ridding their Chinese supply chains of forced labor is “a key priority,” said five trade associations Thursday. After President Donald Trump signed the Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act June 17, “we want to reiterate our continued focus on identifying and eradicating forced labor,” said the American Apparel & Footwear Association, Footwear Distributors & Retailers of America, the National Retail Federation, the Retail Industry Leaders Association and the U.S. Fashion Industry Association. “A successful solution for all involved, above all the workers themselves, will require state-to-state engagement and collaborative partnerships across government, industry, labor advocacy groups, non-governmental organizations, and other stakeholders,” they said. They urged the Trump administration to immediately establish a “multi-stakeholder working group” to deploy “a collective approach that accurately assesses the problem” and identifies “constructive solutions.” The White House didn’t comment.

U.K. Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said his country wasn't “strong-armed” by the U.S. into recent actions against Beijing, saying the U.K. shares many of the same policy goals as the U.S. Instead, Raab said recent U.S. restrictions against Huawei and Chinese officials factored into U.K. policymaking. His country recently announced it's banning Huawei from its 5G network (see 2007140023). “The reality is as a result of U.S. sanctions, we’ve, of course, got to look with a clear-sighted perspective at what that means,” Raab told a news conference Tuesday in London with U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. The U.K.’s measures are “reflective" of what Prime Minister Boris Johnson believed was in "the best interests of the” British people, said Pompeo. He said he thinks Britain "made a good decision," not because the U.S. said it was a good decision but because U.K. leadership concluded it was "the right thing to do.”

Bipartisan legislation would direct the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative to extend expiring exclusions on Trade Act Section 301 tariffs on Chinese goods for at least a year. Thursday's bill, sponsored by Rep. Jackie Walorski, an Indiana Republican on the Ways and Means Committee, and House Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson, D-Minn., would give USTR some discretion. It would exempt the agency from the extension requirement on any product deemed to be important to the Made in China 2025 industrial program or if extending the exclusions would cause “severe harm” to the U.S. USTR would have 15 days from enactment to give Ways and Means and the Senate Finance Committee "detailed justification" for any exemption. The practice has been to extend expiring tariff exclusions through a series of notice and comment rulemakings (see 2007150051). USTR didn’t comment Friday.

China has no ambitions to “challenge or replace the U.S.” as the world’s preeminent superpower, contrary to Attorney General William Barr’s allegations that it’s waging an “economic blitzkrieg” to achieve that goal (see 2007160042), said a Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesperson Friday. “Some in the U.S., driven by ideological bias, have been sparing no effort to paint China as a rival or even adversary,” she said. “Attacking China is their panacea to deal with every domestic political issue. The world has already seen through the U.S. playbook of fabricating narratives to deflect attention.” Concluded the spokesperson: “Possessed by such evil, they are on the brink of losing their mind.” The White House didn't comment.

The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative received some 380 comments on the possibility of punishing Austria, Brazil, the Czech Republic, India, Indonesia, Italy, Spain, Turkey and the U.K. if they start collecting digital service taxes as proposed. USTR is also considering punishing the EU, which is considering a unionwide DST. Trade groups that are concerned about the proposed DSTs -- including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce -- asked the U.S. to continue working toward a global solution through the Organization of Community and Economic Development. Tech groups are less worried about such penalties over other countries' DSTs. "Contrary to some press accounts, the Chamber understands real progress has been achieved in some aspects of the negotiations under way," it wrote. Associations whose tech members would be most affected by DST didn't discourage the use of tariffs. The Information Technology Industry Council said Belgium and Kenya should also be in the crosshairs, because they are also considering such taxes. The Computer & Communications Industry Association praised the use of tariff threats on France's DST, suggesting it could be effective again. "CCIA takes seriously the impact that tariffs can have and, as a general policy view, believes that they only be used in limited circumstances, in a targeted manner, and where there is a clear strategy in place designed to change the behavior of a trading partner. In the French case, it was encouraging that this strong action led to the temporary pause of collection on behalf of the French government in January 2020." The docket is USTR-2020-0022 and here. USTR announced this month it's delaying duties on French goods for now (see 2007100057).

The Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security is considering imposing new license requirements on facial recognition software and surveillance items that may be used by China for crowd control reasons or to violate human rights. BIS seeks feedback by Sept. 15, said Friday's Federal Register. BIS said it's interested in imposing new license requirements for facial recognition software, “other biometric systems for surveillance,” voice print identification systems and other products.

China is conducting an “economic blitzkrieg” to surpass the U.S. as the “world’s preeminent superpower,” Attorney General William Barr told a group at the Gerald Ford Presidential Museum Thursday in Grand Rapids, Michigan. A “centerpiece” of the effort is its Made in China 2025 industrial policy for “domination of high-tech industries like robotics, advanced information technology, aviation, and electric vehicles,” said Barr. “Backed by hundreds of billions of dollars in subsidies, this initiative poses a real threat to U.S. technological leadership.” It defies World Trade Organization rules prohibiting quotas for domestic output, he said. It sets targets for domestic market share as high as 70% “in core components and basic materials for industries such as robotics and telecommunications,” he said. It’s clear that China “seeks not merely to join the ranks of other advanced industrial economies, but to replace them altogether,” said Barr. The Chinese Foreign Affairs Ministry didn’t comment.

The International Trade Commission seeks $2.75 million more for FY 2020, without which it “faces a high risk of failing to successfully carry out” the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement on free trade, Chair Jason Kearns wrote House Commerce Subcommittee leadership Wednesday. The ITC also risks “not meeting its other statutory responsibilities” next fiscal year, “due to a historic increase in workload for all investigative areas,” said Kearns. Unfair import investigations under Tariff Act Section 337 “have remained at historically high levels,” he said. Trump administrative trade policy actions resulted in a “substantial number of revisions to the Harmonized Tariff Schedule, he said. ITC staff have completed 22 HTS revisions this year, compared with the historical “context” of two or three revisions annually, he said.

The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative seeks comment by Aug. 14 in a docket whether it should extend recently granted and forthcoming List 4A tariff exclusions on Chinese imports for up to a year beyond Sept. 1, said a notice. Its evaluation will focus on whether a product remains available only from China, despite imposition of the List 4A tariffs in September, it said: Importers should describe any changes in the global supply chain since List 4A took effect and what they did to source the product from the U.S. or a third country.