Foreign-trade zones would continue to lose out to foreign distribution companies under the changes to de minimis proposed in The Import Security and Fairness Act, the National Association of Foreign-Trade Zones said in a recent letter to House Ways and Means Trade Subcommittee Chairman Rep. Earl Blumenauer, D-Ore., who introduced the bill (see 2201180053). A version of that bill, which would no longer end de minimis treatment for goods subject to Section 232 tariffs, among other changes, was included in the America Competes Act (see 2201260029). While NAFTZ sent its letter before the bill was attached to America Competes, "we don’t support either version because neither allows U.S. companies operating in a U.S. FTZ the same ability to leverage Section 321 de minimus as their foreign competitors can and will still be able to do with the current language of the bill," emailed Melissa Irmen, NAFTZ's chair.
The AFL-CIO said the House version of the China package "includes critically important fixes" to the Senate's trade title, including removing finished products from the Miscellaneous Tariff Bill, changes to antidumping and countervailing duty law, and the change to de minimis, which "would halt China’s exploitation of US de minimis policy."
The leader of the House Ways and Means Trade Subcommittee focused on making it easier for domestic industry to win antidumping and countervailing duty cases and said that the de minimis statute needs to be altered, in a hearing designed to talk about how Chinese practices damage workers, businesses and the environment.
A panel of CBP officials told members of the trade community that they're still considering how to shape a rulemaking based on what they've learned from the Entry Type 86 test and the Section 321 data pilot, but they expect to require 10-digit Harmonized Tariff Schedule codes on de minimis entries that PGAs have an interest in.
CBP will exempt some filers from the requirement to file a 10-digit Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheading on low value shipments that do not have PGA requirements once it finalizes new data elements for Section 321 shipments, Brandon Lord, acting CBP executive director-trade policy and programs, said at the June 23 meeting of the Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee.
The Office of Management and Budget should restart consideration of a proposal to end the de minimis exemption for goods subject to Section 301 tariffs, the National Council of Textile Organizations said in an April 14 letter to acting OMB Director Robert Fairweather. The review of the proposal began at OMB last year (see 2009040026) but was removed as part of a broad regulatory freeze after President Joe Biden took office (see 2101210039). OMB should reopen the review and “grant approval to this much needed change in CBP regulations,” NCTO said.
CBP plans to propose some new requirements for importing low-value shipments, Craig Clark of the Office of the Commissioner, Office of Trade Relations, said during the virtual Advisory Committee on Supply Chain Competitiveness (ACSCC) meeting Jan. 28. “We are taking steps to integrate the results of both the [Section] 321 data pilot and the Entry Type 86 test into a new Section 321 data collection process through a notice of proposed rulemaking,” he said. “Included in that NPRM is a requirement for mandatory security data elements for all Section 321 shipments, and that is going to be agnostic to the mode of transportation and will include international mail as well as additional mandatory data elements if an entry is filed,” he said.
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The mistrust by the current administration of the de minimis exemption for low-value shipments may provide an opportunity to revise the law and address some inconsistent approaches, Bryan Wolfe, vice president-international trade at Ascena Retail Group, said during the National Association of Foreign-Trade Zones virtual conference on Nov. 6. Ascena, the parent company of Ann Taylor, Loft and other brands, is a leading member of Ship Safe Coalition, which advocates for policy changes around de minimis. The coalition expects that some coming changes to the de minimis entry process could be a time for “compromise between eliminating de minimis altogether and keeping it as is,” Wolfe said in his presentation.
A change in administrations could boost the National Association for Foreign-Trade Zones' rear guard action against a proposal for the USMCA technical fixes bill, lobbyist Brian Hannigan told listeners at the NAFTZ virtual conference Oct. 29.