Richard O'Neill was named partner at Neville Peterson, where he was previously an associate attorney, the law firm said in an emailed news release. O'Neill's work is focused on “all aspects of international trade and Customs law, including tariff classification, appraisement, country of origin and trade preference programs, Section 301 and Section 232 tariffs, Free Trade Agreements, export controls and trade remedies,” the firm said.
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Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro said, after a phone call with President Donald Trump Dec. 20, that Brazil will not face tariffs instead of quotas on its steel exports to the United States. Trump had tweeted in early December that the change would come “immediately,” but no Federal Register notice ever put the tweet into action (see 1912020036). He had said at the time that currency devaluation in Brazil and Argentina was “very unfair” to farmers and manufacturers. Argentina and Brazil have taken commodity market share from the U.S. in China, after China imposed tariffs on U.S. products.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative will ask for comments on whether the second set of tariff exclusions on Chinese imports on Section 301 List 1, set to expire March 25, should last another year, it said in a pre-publication notice on its website. The agency will start accepting comments on the extensions in docket number USTR-2019-0024 on Jan. 15. The comments are due by Feb. 15, it said. The USTR recently granted extensions to six exclusions, while letting 25 expire, from the first group of exclusions (see 1912190060).
The U.S. may loosen Section 201 safeguard duties on crystalline silicon photovoltaic cells, according to a notice launching a new International Trade Commission investigation. The U.S. trade representative recently asked the ITC to study the economic effects of raising the threshold below which solar cells enter duty-free from 2.5 gigawatts to 4, 5 or 6 gigawatts, the ITC said. “I request that the Commission analyze the effect of increasing the level of the tariff-rate quota from the current 2.5 gigawatts (“GW”) to 4, 5, or 6 GW, without other changes to the remedy,” the USTR said in the request letter. Currently, imports of solar cells after the first 2.5 gigawatts face a 25 percent tariff, set to fall to 20 percent in February for the third year of the safeguard duty (see 1801230052). Comments are due to the ITC by Jan. 6, 2020.
The volume of Section 301 List 4A tariff exclusion requests surpassed 1,000 on Dec. 19, 49 days after the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative opened the public docket to applications at noon on Halloween. Applicants that are granted exclusions can qualify for refunds of 15 percent tariffs retroactive to Sept. 1, when the duties took effect. List 4A tariffs remain in effect at 15 percent, but are expected to be rolled back by half after the U.S.-China phase one trade deal is signed sometime in January 2020. Under USTR rules, tariff exemptions are granted on all goods imported under a product classification, not just to the company making the exclusion request. Nine applications were filed through Dec. 19 to exempt goods imported under subheading 8517.62.00.90, more than for any consumer tech product with List 4A exposure. The subheading includes a broad swath of consumer tech goods, including smart speakers, Bluetooth headphones, fitness trackers and smartwatches. Virtually all List 4A exclusion requests filed by all companies through Nov. 29 were elevated to the status of a “stage 2 initial substantive review,” the docket shows. The final “stage 4” is when an exclusion request is granted and approved for publication in the Federal Register.
CBP created Harmonized System Update (HSU) 1920 on Dec. 19, containing 40,715 Automated Broker Interface records and 7,393 Harmonized Tariff Schedule records, it said in a CSMS message. The update includes recently announced exclusions and other changes related to the Section 301 tariffs (see 1912060031 and 1912130028). Other changes involve units of quantities and the 2020 Harmonized Tariff Schedule of the U.S.
CBP released its Dec. 11 Customs Bulletin (Vol. 53, No. 45), which includes the following ruling actions:
Fish and Wildlife Service tariff flags are expected to be enforced in ACE for all filers in October 2020, CBP said in a CSMS message. CBP posted the final FWS ACE Implementation Guide on Dec. 18, it said, and plans to make the FWS code available in CBP’s ACE certification environment on March 2. “This document is final and trade users can begin coding accordingly,” CBP said. “The associated FWS samples will be posted soon.” The ACE production pilot will begin April 4, 2020, CBP said. “CBP and FWS are working on a Federal Register Notice with additional details about the FWS Production Pilot,” the message said.
CBP added on Dec. 19 the ability in ACE for importers to file entries with recently excluded goods in the third tranche of Section 301 tariffs, it said in a CSMS message. Filers of imported products that were granted an exclusion (see 1912130028) should report the regular Chapters 03, 08, 21, 48, 54, 56, 73, 76, 83, 84, 85, 87 and 94, CBP said in the message. “Importers shall not submit the corresponding Chapter 99 HTS number for the Section 301 duties when” subheading 9903.88.36 is submitted, CBP said.
Modems manufactured in China and sent to Canada for programming and other processing are not transformed in Canada and should be considered a product of China, CBP said in a Nov. 26 ruling. The ruling was in response to a request from Electroline Equipment, which asked CBP about NAFTA treatment and the country of origin of the transponders. The transponders are subject to the Section 301 tariffs on goods from China because China is the country of origin, the agency said.