Further to the President’s statement on June 15, 2018, on June 18, 2018, the US Trade Representative published on its website an advance copy of the Federal Register notice related to the June 15, 2018 announcement.
The notice confirms that an additional duty of 25% will be imposed on articles classified in the tariff subheadings included in Annex A of the notice as of July 6, 2018. The notice also creates a new Chapter 99 subheading for entry purposes (entries of articles classified in the tariff subheadings identified in Annex A have to use the new Chapter 99 classification as a secondary classification, so the additional 25% duty can be assessed) and addresses foreign trade zone admissions.
The notice also sets the schedule for providing comments on the second list of articles proposed to be assessed an additional 25% duty. This is the list of 284 tariff classifications the interagency Section 301 Committee identified as benefitting from China’s industrial policies, including Made in China 2025 (Annex C in the attached notice). These 284 tariff classifications represent approximately $16 billion worth of imports from China. The public comment schedule is as follows:
- June 29, 2018 – deadline to file a notice requesting to provide testimony at the public hearing
- July 23, 2018 – written comments due
- July 24, 2018 – public hearing at the U.S. International Trade Commission
- July 31, 2018 – rebuttal, post-hearing comments due
This notice does not provide the specifics for the product petition exclusion process referenced on Friday. Instead, this notice says that the details of the product petition exclusion process will be included in a future Federal Register notice.
We are assisting numerous clients detail with these issues (e.g., re-aligning supply chains, filing comments, seeking Congressional support for exclusion requests, etc.) and would be happy to discuss this with you further, if helpful. If you have any questions, please contact the author, Ted Murphy, or any member of the US Customs Group or International Commercial and Trade Practice group with whom you normally work.
