Four Republicans senators reintroduced a bill last week that would require that the executive branch impose sanctions on foreigners responsible for taking U.S. hostages, even if those responsible are government officials. It also creates a mechanism for Congress to require that an administration open a review if a government official was responsible for a hostage taking, and therefore, must be covered by the sanctions. The bill was sponsored by Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, Sen. Todd Young, R-Ind. and Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla., and introduced April 16. Hawley and Cotton sponsored another bill, called the Global Hostages Act, in 2019 that did not move in committee. Although it is called the Global Hostage Act, it would also apply to politically motivated harassment, abuse, extortion or arrests of American citizens and permanent residents, not just imprisonment or detainment.
Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., and Sen. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., are promoting a bill they say should guide government investments in advanced manufacturing or industrial research, and should be a companion to the Endless Frontier Act. The National Strategy to Ensure American Leadership (SEAL) Act would ask the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine to identify which technologies will be the critical ones in the next five to 10 years, where if the U.S. is not a strong player, it could hurt the economy.
U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai's conversations with her counterparts from Italy and the Netherlands addressed global overcapacity in steel, according to summaries of the video calls released April 16. The administration has suggested that Section 232 tariffs on aluminum and steel cannot be removed until overcapacity has been addressed, even when the countries subject to those tariffs are not dumping steel or aluminum in their exports to the U.S.
While Vietnam, Taiwan, and Switzerland exceeded thresholds established by the Treasury Department to identify potentially unfair currency practices, a report from the department released April 16 said there is no evidence that they manipulated their currency to gain unfair trade advantage. The report noted that in early 2021, Treasury offices began “enhanced bilateral engagement with Vietnam and is working with the Vietnamese authorities to develop a plan with specific actions to address the underlying causes of Vietnam’s currency undervaluation.” It was already engaged with Switzerland on the topic, and will continue those discussions. It said similar talks should be done with Taiwan. The report noted that the Taiwanese currency appreciated in 2020, but given the strength of Taiwan's economy that year, it did not rise as much as would be expected.
The National Pork Producers' Legislative Action Conference made advocating for market access in Vietnam one of its top three priorities, the trade group said April 14. The NPP Council urged farmers to ask their representatives to sign onto a letter led by Reps. Ron Kind, D-Wis.; Darin LaHood, R-Ill; Dusty Johnson, R-S.D.; and Jim Costa, D-Calif. That letter, sent to U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai, asks, "While you discuss the full range of trade issues with Vietnam, including those subject to Section 301 investigations, please consider pressing for further market access for U.S. pork."
U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai heard from 16 unions, UNITE HERE and the AFL-CIO on their wish for the U.S. to drop its opposition to a Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) agreement waiver for COVID-19 vaccines (see 2102260053). In a readout of the April 13 online meeting, the agency said: “Ambassador Tai reiterated that the Biden-Harris Administration’s top priority is saving lives and ending the pandemic in the United States and around the world. The Ambassador conveyed the Administration’s commitment to increasing Covid-19 vaccine production and distribution, both at home and worldwide.”
At a time when hurricane damage, violence and poverty are driving more Central Americans to the U.S., consultants, advocates and former diplomats say the Central America Free Trade Agreement, or CAFTA, needs changes to spur development in Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador. Those Northern Triangle countries are the ones sending large numbers of asylum seekers to the U.S. in the last few years. Kellie Meiman Hock, a McLarty Associates managing partner who led the April 14 panel hosted by the Washington International Trade Association, noted that when CAFTA was ratified more than 15 years ago, the hope was that it would bring more economic development to Central America. But instead, trade from the region has been flat.
U.S.-China Business Council President Craig Allen, former deputy assistant secretary for China in the State Department, said that the Chinese were taken by surprise by how little has changed in the new administration. “There was an expectation between [Donald] Trump and [Joe] Biden, there would be a loosening of technology regulations,” he said, but Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo has taken steps to tighten export restrictions that affect Huawei, and there have been actions under the new Information, Communications and Telecommunications Services (ICTS) regulations.
European professors speaking about the future of the trans-Atlantic trade relationship said that while it's logical for democratic, rule-of-law countries to coordinate trade policy against an authoritarian rival, that's easier said than done.
Toasts not Tariffs, a coalition of 48 trade groups in the liquor and wine industries, restaurants and retailers, wrote to the commerce and agriculture secretaries and the U.S. trade representative to urge them to convince the European Union and the United Kingdom to lift 25% tariffs on U.S. whiskey exports. The April 12 letter did not mention that those tariffs were in response to 25% tariffs on steel exports from the EU and the U.K., and that lifting the tariffs on steel would end tariffs on whiskey.