Today, the Trump administration’s China trade war intensified as it announced plans to increase tariffs on Lists 1, 2, 3, and 4!
The president connected the additional tariff hikes to China’s new retaliatory tariffs (as a result of US’s imposition of List 4 tariffs) on $75 billion-dollar in US products, mainly impacted the agricultural and auto industries, or President Trump’s base (as previously reported here).
So what are the changes?
USTR announced it will open the exclusion request process for HTS’s on List 4A. List 4A includes products covered by Annex A of the August 20, 2019 notice (84 FR 43304) that are subject to 15% duty as of September 1, 2019.
List 4 has a total of 300 Billion worth of products and includes both lists 4A & 4B. 15% duties for List 4B (products covered by Annex C of the August 20 notice) are effective December 15, 2019, and no exclusion process has yet been discussed for 4B.
Exclusion portal opens October 31, 2019, and closes on January 31, 2020.
Contact us today to get your request in timely!
DTL helps clients strategize how to identify the strongest argument to persuade the government in granting your exclusion request. DTL was active in assisting clients submit exclusion requests for List 3.
Did you know that the Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) announced additional changes to U.S. policy toward Cuba implemented on October 9? On September 6th, the Trump Administration announced measures to increase economic pressure on the Cuban military regime. This follows past policy changes President Trump has taken to sanction the Cuban government for its daily human rights abuses against the Cuban people and abroad. Earlier this year, the President restricted non-family travel to Cuba by removing the travel exemption category of “people-to-people” travel to the island.
Today, President Trump and the Chinese government announced a “Phase 1 Deal” and suspended the proposed increase in tariffs for products (on Lists 1, 2, and 3) that were set to begin on October 15. The scheduled tariff was set to increase from 25 to 30 percent on $250 billion worth of Chinese imports. In exchange, the Chinese government will buy $40-50 billion worth of American agricultural goods, and the agreement will include terms on both intellectual property rights and financial services.
After winning the largest arbitration award (7.5 billion) in World Trade Organization (WTO) history in its dispute with the European Union (EU) over illegal subsidies to Airbus, the United States (US) will begin applying WTO-approved tariffs on certain EU goods beginning October 18. Although USTR has the authority to apply a 100 percent tariff on affected products, at this time the tariff increases will be limited to 10% on large civil aircrafts and 25% on agricultural and other products. The U.S. has the authority to increase the tariffs at any time, or change the products affected.