On December 31, 2019, the US Trade Representative (USTR) posted on its website an advance copy of a Federal Register notice that announces USTR’s determination to grant certain exclusion requests, as specified in the Annex to this notice, and corrects a ministerial error in a previously announced exclusion. The product exclusions announced in the notice will apply as of the September 24, 2018, effective date of the $200 billion action, to August 7, 2020. The amendment announced in the notice is retroactive to the date the original exclusion was published.
As set out in the Annex, the exclusions are reflected in 2 ten-digit HTSUS subheadings and 66 specially prepared product descriptions, which cover 81 separate exclusion requests.
The exclusions are available for any product that meets the description in the Annex, regardless of whether the importer filed an exclusion request. Further, the scope of each exclusion is governed by the scope of the product descriptions in the Annex, and not by the product descriptions set out in any particular request for exclusion. To correct a technical error and in order to conform to USTR’s intent to grant an exclusion requested, the Annex also includes amendments to notes in the Harmonized Tariff Schedule of the United States.
- Paragraph A, subparagraphs (3)–(7) are conforming amendments to the HTSUS reflecting the modifications made by the Annex.
- Paragraph B, subparagraphs (1)-(2) are amendments to U.S. note 20(ll)(66) published at 84 FR 57803 (October 28, 2019) and U.S. note 20(mm)(34) published at 84 FR 61674 (November 13, 2019) reflecting modifications made to certain HTSUS statistical reporting numbers that will take effect January 1, 2020.
- Paragraph C, fixes a technical error in U.S. note 20(b) to subchapter III of chapter 99 of the HTSUS.
The Office of the USTR regularly updates the status of each pending request on the USTR Exclusions Portal at https://exclusions.ustr.gov/s/docket?docketNumber=USTR-2019-0005
