Mara Lee

A bipartisan bill to end cash deposit collections on newsprint and that would delay antidumping and countervailing duty final determinations in those cases was introduced in the House of Representatives by Rep. Kristi Noem, R-S.D., and Rep. Charlie Crist, D-Fla. Both this bill and a version introduced in May in the Senate are called the PRINT Act, for Protecting Rational Incentives in Newsprint Trade Act of 2018. The top cash deposit rate on a company for the countervailing duty case is 9.93% (see 1801120008); most Canadian exports face a 22.16% antidumping cash deposit (see 1803160046).

President Donald Trump has repeatedly vowed to raise tariffs on longtime allies because, in his view, they have ripped off America. But at a post-G-7 press conference, he laid out the consequence if they don't drop their tariffs to the same level as the U.S. "It's going to change. They have no choice. If it's not going to change, we're not going to trade with them," he said. He listed Canada, the European Union -- which he called "brutal" -- and India as offenders that could be barred from exporting to the U.S.

If the Securing the International Mail Against Opioids Act of 2018 becomes law, the Government Accountability Office will evaluate how effective the use of advance electronic data has been in stopping the flow of fentanyl and other opioid packages, and it will assess "whether the detection of illicit synthetic opioids in the international mail would be improved by requiring the Postal Service to serve as the consignee for international mail shipments containing goods; or designating a customs broker to act as an importer of record for international mail shipments containing goods."

BALTIMORE -- Trade policy under President Donald Trump is upending years of largely consistent approaches to U.S. trading partners, panelists said during the American Association of Exporters and Importers annual conference on June 8. While the panelists mostly agreed that the consequences of the tariff-centric approach is too harsh, some expressed sympathy with the administration's general reaction to globalization.

BALTIMORE -- CBP Commissioner Kevin McAleenan told an audience of import and export professionals that CBP is going to use the White House directive on regulatory reform to edit regulations across many areas, including bonded warehouses, foreign-trade zones, vessel arrival, e-bonds and ending the requirement that customs brokers have local certification. McAleenan, who was speaking at the American Association of Exporters and Importers annual conference June 8, also touched on agency initiatives in improving screening of small packages, protecting trademarks and copyrights, and blocking shipments of goods produced with forced labor. He encouraged everyone to make e-allegations on forced labor, and said he just received one from junior high school students in Maine who are concerned about slave labor in the chocolate industry.

BALTIMORE -- There are some barriers to data sharing among NAFTA companies that would ease goods' flow across borders, but progress is steady, panelists said at the American Association of Exporters and Importers annual conference. Kim Campbell, founder of MKMarin, a Canadian trade services firm, said some of the problems with data sharing on Canadian exports is that Canada generally doesn't ask exporters to submit information if they're sending their goods to their southern neighbor. "We don’t actually collect export data into the United States," she said, and shipments from Canada to Mexico are often not tracked, either, because firms took advantage of the lack of reporting requirement for shipments south, as goods transited across the U.S.

House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady, R-Texas, characterized a meeting with U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer as a good dialogue, but according to some media reports, Democrats who attended the June 7 meeting said Lighthizer did not provide a clear explanation of where the U.S. is in NAFTA talks or in the China trade dispute. "My message remains the same: our trade practices need to hit the right target which is China … not our allies, and certainly not Americans," Brady said in a statement issued after the meeting. "But the Administration’s recent actions don’t achieve that goal."

BALTIMORE -- More than 15 years after CBP implemented the Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (CTPAT) program, it's time to raise the standards for supply chain security, said Liz Schmelzinger, CTPAT director at CBP. "CTPAT is 17 years old now," she said, and "really not as effective as it used to be." Most pressing is the need for companies to examine cybersecurity aspects of the supply chain, she said, as the risk of data breaches and cyberattacks continues to grow.

President Donald Trump blasted allies' trade practices just before heading to the G-7 summit in Canada in a tweet storm that included repeated swipes at Canadian dairy practices, European tariffs and trade deficits. "Please tell Prime Minister Trudeau and President Macron that they are charging the U.S. massive tariffs and create non-monetary barriers," he said in one tweet, before closing with, "Look forward to seeing them tomorrow."

BALTIMORE -- There has been a long wait for details on how drawback will work under the Trade Facilitation and Trade Enforcement Act, but Dave Corn, vice president of Comstock and Theakston, said things are going to be moving in the next month. The Office of Management and Budget is required to send the proposed rule back to CBP by July 5, and Corn said he expects CBP to release a proposed rule notification a week or two after OMB acts. A lawsuit on whether CBP's action to change accelerated payment practices was outside its authority for interim guidance should also be resolved within a few weeks, he said while speaking at the American Association of Exporters and Importers annual conference on June 8.