The Commerce Department published its spring 2023 regulatory agenda for the Bureau of Industry and Security and the Census Bureau, including new rules that will add more entities to the Entity List and finalize new export filing requirements.
Canada and Mexico talked about the panel ruling on auto rules of origin -- a decision that went their way but that the U.S. has chosen not to implement -- and Canada brought up the issue with U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai as well, according to readouts from Mexico and Canada about the bilateral meetings July 6 ahead of the official Free Trade Commission meeting in Cancun, Mexico.
The U.S. and India announced a deal June 22 that will end India’s retaliatory tariffs on some U.S. goods while leaving in place the Section 232 steel and aluminum tariffs that prompted them, and also end six World Trade Organization disputes brought by both the U.S. and India.
Think tank scholars said the World Trade Organization isn't well suited to deal with technology sharing restrictions, but that the G-7 and coordinated bilateral actions have been effective so far.
World Trade Organization members negatively affected by national security-related trade restrictions may be able to impose retaliatory measures as a way to address the U.S. gripe with the body's review of national security issues, former Office of the U.S. Trade Representative counsel Warren Maruyama and former WTO deputy director-general Alan Wolff said. In a working paper released by the Peterson Institute for International Economics, Maruyama and Wolff propose a compromise to the U.S. position that national security claims are nonreviewable.
U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai and her counterpart from the EU, Valdis Dombrovskis, said their discussions on a critical minerals agreement and a deal to privilege green steel and aluminum trade were productive. It was the fourth time this year that Tai and the EU's top trade official met.
U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai said her team is on "phase three" of its reform talks at the World Trade Organization, saying that phase brings in all WTO members. Tai, speaking during a March 24 House Ways and Means Committee hearing, said her team in Geneva is "bringing written proposals every meeting" with the goal of making "a more functional negotiating forum." The aim is to move WTO dispute settlement away from litigation and toward negotiation, Tai said. She also decried the WTO's recent rulings against the Section 232 national security tariff action, saying they "are deeply concerning to us and to our national security sovereignty."
A trade group for the Mexican steel industry, CANACERO, warned that Mexico likely will retaliate against U.S. steel exports if the U.S. reimposes 25% tariffs on Mexican steel -- and the U.S. exports much more steel to Mexico than vice versa.
The U.S. will appeal a World Trade Organization dispute panel ruling that found its origin marking requirement for goods from Hong Kong violated global trade rules. Submitting its notification of appeal during the Jan. 27 meeting of the WTO's Dispute Settlement Body, the U.S. said it was taking the matter to the defunct Appellate Body concurrent with separate panel rulings that said the Section 232 national security tariffs also violated WTO commitments.
The U.S. filed appeals against four World Trade Organization dispute panel rulings that found the U.S. Section 232 national security tariffs on steel and aluminum violated global trade rules. The U.S. said during the Jan. 27 meeting of the dispute settlement body it will take the case to the Appellate Body -- the next tier of the WTO's dispute settlement system that stands defunct due to U.S. refusal to seat members on the body over reform concerns.