Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, led a bipartisan letter to U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer arguing that he should not push for returning treatment of foreign-trade zones to the NAFTA approach, and instead, should allow goods manufactured in those zones to receive tariff benefits if they meet USMCA rules of origin. This issue has been hanging up a technical fixes bill since the summer (see 2007200021).
Former U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab said that although President-elect Joe Biden has signaled that trade is not a priority for him, he is unlikely to be able to put it on the back burner completely until the COVID-19 crisis and economic recession are resolved. “Trade is going to come to them even if they don’t necessarily want to go to trade,” she said during a Peterson Institute for International Economics Trade Talks interview Nov. 24. When Biden is at a G-7 or G-20 meeting, and other heads of state bring up trade, “What are you going to do? Say, 'I'm not going to do trade for the next two or three years'? So, you can’t underestimate what happens when [India's] Prime Minister [Narendra] Modi wants to talk to you about trade. Or [China's President] Xi Jinping wants to talk to you about trade. Or [German Chancellor] Angela Merkel wants to talk to you about trade.”
House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal, D-Mass., said there should be “a reset of our trade agenda,” with less emphasis on tariffs “and more emphasis on international cooperation and multilateral relationships.” Neal, who was speaking to the New England Council on Nov. 23, said that “keeping the heat on China is important, but simultaneously, tariffs are not the only way to do it.”
U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer said he has no substantive regrets about the policies his office has spearheaded that have raised tariffs on products from around the world. He said the next USTR will also have to prioritize American manufacturers over inexpensive imports, and treat China as a threat. “Those things are going to endure and people will continue to make progress on them,” he said during an evening webinar Nov. 19.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative announced Nov. 19 that U.S. and Ecuadoran officials talked trade and investment on Nov. 10, covering intellectual property, the environment, labor and agricultural trade. The two sides are working on a Protocol on Trade Rules and Transparency, and plan to conclude before the end of the year. The protocol would include provisions on trade facilitation, good regulatory practices, anti-corruption, and cooperation on small and medium-sized enterprises. A fourth meeting of the group of negotiators is planned to be in Ecuador next year.
In a Joe Biden administration, some tariffs can be unilaterally withdrawn, but others would require complex negotiations to sort out, said Peterson Institute for International Economics nonresident senior fellow Anabel Gonzalez. She asked PIIE Senior Fellow Chad Bown and former U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman where they think the new administration's energies should be directed, during a Nov. 18 webinar.
The U.S. needs to work closer with allies on export controls and foreign investment screening to counter China, a Republican House member and two former Trump administration officials said. They said the U.S.’s current unilateral approach to trade restrictions is not working and could cede U.S. technology leadership to China.
Twenty-three trade groups, led by the Distilled Spirits Council of the United States and Farmers for Free Trade, are asking U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer to work harder to resolve the Airbus-Boeing dispute, and thus remove European Union retaliatory tariffs on distilled spirits, cheeses, potatoes, nuts, fruits, juices, chocolate, ketchup and agricultural equipment. These retaliatory tariffs are the second round on ag exports, as the EU put 25% tariffs on whiskey, orange juice, rice and sweet corn in 2018 over steel and aluminum tariffs imposed by the U.S. Some will rise to 50% next June, the groups said in a Nov. 18 letter.
The European Council approved a tariff package that would eliminate customs duties on U.S. lobster imports in exchange for reduced U.S. duties on several European Union products, including prepared meals, crystal glassware, surface preparations, propellant powders and lighters (see 2008210028). The package, which the European Union said would be the first EU-U.S. tariff reduction in two decades, could increase market access for both EU and U.S. traders by about $240 million per year, the council said in a Nov. 18 news release. The package needs European Parliament approval. If enacted, it would take effect retroactively from Aug. 1 for five years.
More than a dozen countries officially signed the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership on Nov. 15 after years of negotiations (see 2005130018), paving the way for lower trade barriers for a range of countries throughout the Asia Pacific. The deal -- signed by the 10 Association of Southeast Asian Nations member states and China, Japan, Australia, South Korea and New Zealand -- aims to become an “unprecedented mega regional trading arrangement,” the countries said in a joint statement, covering a market of about 2.2 billion people.