Many U.S. importers "tend to just assume things are on the up and up" with their vendors, said Pete Mento, vice president for global trade and managed services at Crane Worldwide Logistics. Mento, who conducted a webinar on free trade deals May 24, said that's a mistake. Mento said often "people are claiming free trade agreements simply because it was flown to the U.S." from a free-trade partner country. "You gotta be able to prove your stuff qualifies. Because if you can’t prove it, the government’s going to come down on you like the hammer of the gods," he said.
Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, who faced many critical questions from House Democrats on the China trade war, told them that consumer goods were left until last for a reason, and that a decision on levying tariffs on the remaining imports from China -- including toys, apparel, cellphones and computers -- has not yet been made. “There won’t be any decision probably for another 30 to 45 days," Mnuchin testified at the Financial Services Committee May 22. He said that he had recently spoken to the chief financial officer at Walmart about the increase in tariffs on the third tranche of Section 301 tariffs and the possibility of tariffs on nearly all remaining imports.
The top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee told U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer in a May 22 letter that panel blocking is a mistake, and that trying to use Section 301 tariffs to enforce trade commitments of Canada or Mexico won't work. Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., wrote: "So far, the Administration’s justification for this mechanism has only increased my worry that the new Agreement will not be enforced." He acknowledged "certain improvements" in the labor and environment chapters, but said, "all of the obligations become meaningless if the United States cannot effectively and swiftly enforce them."
U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer would like some help from the Senate to move the House toward ratifying the new NAFTA, he said while speaking at the Senate Republicans' lunch about prospects for ratification and the work he's doing to get a trade deal done with Japan. Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., said Lighthizer told them to convince colleagues in the House to support it. "It was just cheerleading, 'rah, rah, sis boom bah,'" Kennedy complained. "I hope I'm wrong, but I don't understand why my colleagues think that Speaker [Nancy] Pelosi's going to agree to anything that will help the president. But I mean, I wish she would put the country first, but if you believe in watching what people do, not what they say, I'm not encouraged."
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., said that U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer has been asking Democratic leaders for specifics on what they need him to do to get their support, and Hoyer said he thinks there will be "more productive conversations" on those specifics between Trade Subcommittee Chairman Earl Blumenauer, D-Ore., his staff, and the office of the USTR. "Those specifics are essential," Hoyer said in response to a question from International Trade Today during a May 21 press conference.
The Trump administration tried for months to insist that Mexico and Canada accept quotas on their steel and aluminum, and the fact that the administration lifted its tariffs on those metals on its NAFTA partners without any import restrictions shows "just how much the Administration has invested in passage of the USMCA," wrote Ted Murphy, managing partner of the Baker McKenzie office, in a blog post.
California's Kevin McCarthy, the leader of House Republicans, has said the new NAFTA only needs a "few votes" to get a majority in the House, where ratification will begin. But when asked by International Trade Today if his side has a sense of how many Republican "no" votes there might be, McCarthy said they haven't asked. In 1993, 43 Republicans voted against ratifying NAFTA.
Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland, speaking May 15 at the U.S. Capitol after meeting with the head of the Senate Finance Committee and the House Trade Subcommittee chairman, declined to predict when the U.S. and Canada might reach a resolution on Section 232 tariffs and Canada's retaliatory tariffs because of them. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin testified earlier in the day in the Senate, and said there that "I think we’re close to an understanding with Mexico and Canada" on the tariffs.
As the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative considers which European products to target in retaliation for launch subsidies to Airbus aircraft, it's getting divergent messages from U.S. aerospace interests. Boeing says it's not a time for half-measures or gradual steps, after 15 years of negotiations and legal action at the World Trade Organization. Instead, USTR should put 100 percent tariffs on Airbus planes, wings, tails and fuselages, said the aircraft maker's chief executive for regulatory and legislative affairs, Theodore Austell. He argued that if it's not at 100 percent, "we're unlikely to get their attention."
House members that are leaders on trade, in the center and on the left, say that U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer is recognizing the ways he's going to need to change the new NAFTA to get Democratic votes, but it's not yet clear how far he'll be willing or able to go. Wisconsin's Rep. Ron Kind, a New Democrat and free trader, said in a hallway interview with International Trade Today May 10, "We're kind of at an impasse. They keep telling us there's no way they can open this up and tweak it, and make this minor adjustment and we're saying ... we haven't met a trade agreement yet where members of Congress weren't allowed to get our fingerprints on it a little bit, massage it here and there for it to get to 218 [votes]. So, until somewhat blinks on that front ... ."