Mara Lee

A group of 14 House Democrats, led by New Jersey's Frank Pallone, introduced H.R. 7115, the 3D Firearms Prevention Act. The bill, introduced Nov. 2, would prohibit the distribution into commerce or import into the U.S. of "certain firearm receiver castings or blanks, assault weapon parts kits, and machine gun parts kits," among other priorities. Given the number of budget bills that have to be addressed in the lame duck session, the chances of the bill becoming law this year are very slim. It would have to be reintroduced next year, because bills expire at the end of each two-year congressional term.

The aluminum producers of Canada, Mexico and the U.S. have written their leaders -- as well as Mexico's president-elect -- asking that tariffs on aluminum be lifted, without quotas, before Nov. 30. "The USMCA cannot work for the aluminum industry or our many downstream customers without exempting Canada and Mexico from the [Section] 232 tariffs or quotas," the three trade groups wrote in a Nov. 5 letter. They suggested that unnaturally cheap Chinese aluminum cannot come into the U.S. through a free-trade backdoor. "Canada recently moved to align its country of origin marking regime for steel and aluminum products to prevent transshipment and diversion of aluminum and steel. Mexico has initiated an anti-dumping case on aluminum foil imports from China," the letter said, so the tariffs in the region are no longer needed. The U.S. aluminum trade group never supported aluminum tariffs on allies.

The main advisory committee for the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative unanimously supports the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement as "far better than the existing NAFTA," and encouraged Congress to enact it as quickly as possible. The committee includes three union leaders, and the rest of its 21 members are either from right of center think tanks or business interests.

Mauritania, which exported about $54.9 million in goods to the U.S. last year under trade preferences, will be barred from the African Growth and Opportunity Act at the beginning of 2019, because of its continuing problem with forced labor. Virtually all of the imports that are covered by AGOA are fuel, though the U.S. does import a few million dollars' worth of fish, fertilizers and other products. President Donald Trump sent a notification of the change to Congress on Nov. 2.

China wants to make it more likely that imports will rise by taking more steps "to lower tariffs, facilitate customs clearance, reduce institutional costs in import, and step up cross-border e-commerce," President Xi Jinping said in a speech Nov. 5 in Shanghai at the first China International Import Expo. Most purchases of industrial goods made by American companies are of products made in China -- most of the U.S. exports to China are commodities, like chemicals and soybeans.

The Commerce Department's Office of Inspector General announced that it has begun an audit of the Section 232 tariff exclusion process, with the objective of determining whether the Bureau of Industry and Security and International Trade Administration are adhering to the procedures to review those product exclusion requests, and whether "decisions are reached in a consistent and transparent manner."

The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative has made its way through 7,818 requests for exclusions from the first tranche of Section 301 tariffs, and has asked CBP to determine if it is practical to admit the products at the border that are covered by 238 requests. Many of the requests that are in this provisional status cover the same HTS codes. The agency is tracking where requests are in the process through spreadsheets on its website, and marks those that are worthy of an exclusion as "stage 3." But those exclusions are provisional until the customs authority says they're administrable.

CBP has identified 14 use cases for blockchain as part of its pilot of the technology, according to Kati Suominen, founder and CEO of Nextrade Group and the lead speaker at a Center for Strategic and International Studies panel discussion on harnessing the technology. But the U.S. is not out front in adopting blockchain technology, either in business or in government, she said. Fifteen countries in Africa are using blockchain in customs, and Mexico, Costa Rica, Peru, South Korea and Singapore are all experimenting with it as well.

China and trade war watchers were aflutter after President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping had a phone call Nov. 1 and both sides sounded upbeat. Trump tweeted that it was "a long and very good conversation," mostly about trade, and that "those discussions are moving along nicely." In China, the readout from Xinhua emphasized how seriously the U.S. it taking its preparation for the in-person meeting later this month in Argentina, and said that Trump said, "it is very important for the heads of state of the United States and China to keep frequent, direct communication.... Trump also said he attaches importance to a good relationship with Xi and is willing to extend, through Xi, his good wishes to the Chinese people."

Because less than a quarter of vehicles sold in the U.S. are assembled outside the NAFTA region, if 25 percent tariffs are levied on auto parts, the impact would be uneven across the auto industry. Mexico parts production -- with substantial room to grow -- is shielded from future tariffs as part of a tariff rate quota system outlined in the new NAFTA. Still, the National Automobile Dealers Association believes the hit to auto sales would be swift and severe. Patrick Mazzi, a senior economist for NADA, talked about the impact of the administration's trade policy at the National Economists Club Nov. 1.