Mara Lee

A bipartisan group of a dozen senators have asked the secretary of commerce and the U.S. trade representative to open negotiations with Canada with an eye to renewing a softwood lumber agreement similar to the one in place between 2006 and 2015. Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., and Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., led the letter, which they released publicly on Sept. 12. The old agreement protected domestic producers through quotas, but had escape valves tied to the market price. The senators noted that with antidumping and countervailing duties on Canadian imports (see 1801020034), it has become more expensive to build houses or make window frames.

It's odd to be talking about blockchain in terms of regulatory policy, said Aaron Arnold, a fellow at Harvard University who studies trade controls to prevent proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. "The technology itself is meant to disintermediate actors," he said during a panel on blockchain and trade security at the Stimson Center, a Washington think tank that focuses on security.

China says that since the U.S. missed its late August deadline to implement changes required by a loss in a case before the appellate body at the World Trade Organization, it would like permission to suspend $7 billion worth of concessions in trade with the U.S. The case, begun in 2013, concerns the methodology of determining antidumping duties in non-market countries, primarily Vietnam and China. If a company accused of dumping product in the U.S. does not cooperate with a Commerce investigation in a way that the U.S. believes it is independent of state control, Commerce assigns a country-wide dumping duty. The WTO said that approach can be problematic in some instances (see 1610190037). China's request will be considered on Sept. 21. The U.S. can request arbitration on its changes to comply with the ruling, or can ask for a compliance panel to be formed.

Politicians from Texas expressed anxiety and optimism about the future of NAFTA as they talked to a group of young Hispanics from around the country assembled for the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute in Washington on Sept. 11. "Most of us are hopeful we will eventually have a trilateral agreement," said Rep. Filemon Vela, D-Texas, who was introducing the panel of those associated with interest groups and an academic. He said NAFTA is "dependent on the interwoven aspects of the economy of all three nations," so a Mexico-U.S. pact is not enough. "If we have to move forward on a bilateral basis, in all likelihood things will not go very well," he said.

Canada continues to avoid characterizing how close it is to reaching an agreement on NAFTA with the U.S., and Canada's Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland sought to both downplay the significance of her return to Washington for just one day and to point to it as a sign of her deep commitment to reaching a deal.

The formal notification of a NAFTA deal may not comply with the Trade Promotion Authority law, according to Washington state Democrat Rep. Suzan DelBene, who sits on the House Ways and Means Committee, and six of her colleagues. "While we appreciate that it takes time to iron out the final details and text, we believe that it is not in the spirit of TPA to send Congress an official notification letter until all three parties have formally agreed to move forward together with an updated trilateral agreement," they wrote to U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer Sept. 10.

China is a bigger problem than Canada, President Donald Trump told reporters Sept. 7 on Air Force One, and said he has tariffs ready to go on all the other Chinese products that have not faced additional tariffs in the trade war thus far. "Nobody has ever done what I’ve done. The $200 billion we’re talking about, could take place very soon, depending what happens with them," he said, referring to the third tranche of Chinese goods subject to Section 301 tariffs (see 1807110050), whose comment period ended Sept. 6. "And I hate to say that, but behind that, there’s another $267 billion ready to go on short notice, if I want. That totally changes the equation," he said, according to various media reports.

Even as President Donald Trump and a top Mexican negotiator suggest that NAFTA could be resolved on Sept. 8, Canada's Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland continued to sidestep questions about how close Canada is to arriving at a deal. "My negotiating counterparty is Ambassador [Robert] Lighthizer. I think that question is really to the president," she said. "We're making progress."

It's uncertain how long it would take the International Trade Commission to report on the economic impact of an updated NAFTA, as required under Trade Promotion Authority, ITC Chairman David Johanson said during an Appropriations subcommittee hearing on Sept. 6. Commerce Subcommittee Chairman Jerry Moran, R-Kan., asked Johanson if the ITC's evaluation could be started before a deal signing and inquired on how long it might take. Johanson said he could not say how long it would take, but acknowledged they cannot even start without the text, and they do not have the text yet for the U.S.-Mexico agreement that was announced in late August. The ITC has 105 days from signing to finish, and if it took that long, a vote would likely come no sooner than the middle of next year, because Congress also has 45 session days to write the implementing legislation.

The Miscellaneous Tariff Bill, which will lower tariffs on nearly 1,700 items, will restore a program that ended in 2012 -- as long as the president doesn't veto it. This version differed slightly from a bill previously passed by the House and was already approved by the Senate (see 1807270003). President Donald Trump is expected to sign the bill, though one Trump ally made another call for a veto of the legislation following its passage in the House Sept. 4.