WASHINGTON, D.C., (April 13, 2022) — Today, Americans for Free Trade (AFT), a broad coalition of American businesses, trade organizations, and workers united against tariffs submitted a statement for the record to leadership of the Senate Finance and House Ways & Means Committees following the committees’ hearings regarding the Biden administration’s 2022 Trade Policy Agenda.
“As companies in the U.S. continue to recover from the global pandemic, face supply chain disruptions, and operate in an inflationary economic environment, we continue to call upon the administration to use more strategic tools to address China’s unfair trade practices without further damaging U.S. competitiveness,” Americans for Free Trade wrote. “We continue to call for an end to the China 301 tariffs that have had a disproportionate economic impact on American companies, consumers, and workers and that have failed to change China’s unfair trade practices.”
In addition to calling for an end to existing Section 301 tariffs, AFT urged the committees to include language in a conferenced China competition bill that would require the Office of the United States Trade Representative to reinstitute a comprehensive, transparent, and fair exclusions process – with retroactivity – for products subject to the Section 301 tariffs. Beyond that, AFT urged the committees to inquire about USTR’s plans for reviewing the tariffs, including timing and opportunities for stakeholder input.
The full text of the letter may be found here.