Ways and Means Committee Moves Anti-Counterfeit Bill, Allowing More CBP Disclosure
The House Ways and Means Committee passed a bill that would give CBP more leeway to share information about suspected counterfeit goods with private companies. The bill would allow CBP to use a "reasonable suspicion" standard to provide nonpublic information about the merchandise generated by an online marketplace, an express consignment operator, a freight forwarder or "any other entity that plays a role in the sale or importation of merchandise into the United States or the facilitation of such sale or importation."
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The bill was sponsored by Reps. Blake Moore, R-Utah, and Brad Schneider, D-Ill., and now awaits a vote on the House floor.
Congress has been trying to tackle this issue for a number of years. A Senate companion bill from Sens. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Maggie Hassan, D-N.H., was introduced in August (see 2508130030); Grassley also introduced a bill in 2021 (see 2104160033, and the pair tried and failed to get language in last year's National Defense Authorization Bill.
At the time the bills were introduced, the lawmakers offered this example of how this could work. "A counterfeit electronics shipment from Shenzhen repeatedly enters via the Port of Los Angeles, using the same fake return address and tracking patterns. With this bill, CBP can share these patterns with carriers like UPS, DHL, and FedEx to intercept future parcels earlier in the pipeline."
Ways and Means Chairman Jason Smith, R-Mo., said on Dec. 10, as the committee prepared to vote on the bill, "Valuable American IP has been the target of theft by foreign competitors for decades. This bill frees Customs and Border Protection to closely coordinate with the private sector when it suspects that imported merchandise violates U.S. intellectual property laws."
The American Apparel and Footwear Association welcomed the action, saying that the bill "clarifies CBP’s ability to share information with brands, not only from products and packaging, but also from packing materials connected to suspected counterfeit shipments. It also expands the definition of who qualifies as a 'person' eligible to receive information from CBP, allowing the agency to address longstanding challenges to the enforcement of intellectual property rights by strengthening information shared with stakeholders in intellectual property enforcement. By widening both the scope of information and the pool of partners, the legislation aims to break down information silos, improve enforcement efficiency, and better support efforts to identify and stop counterfeit items."