Hawley Introduces Bill to End MFN Treatment of Chinese Imports
Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., has introduced a bill that would end most favored nation tariff treatment for China, part of what he calls the workers' agenda.
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Although China does not face Column 2 tariffs, the additional 25% tariffs on 6,797 tariff lines makes importing thousands of Chinese goods comparable to Column 2 duties. Many of those non-MFN duties on manufactured goods are 10%, 25%, 27.5% and 30%.
The bill, introduced last week, also gives the president authority to hike tariffs beyond Column 2, as was done with Russian imports.
“As we face a new age of competition with China, we need an agenda in Washington that will make our working class strong and independent. We can start by revoking the sweetheart deal D.C. elites handed to China 23 years ago -- end normal trade relations, put in place strong tariffs, and protect American workers," Hawley said in a news release announcing the bill.
In a hallway interview at the Capitol March 28, Hawley said he hopes there will be a vote on the bill "sometime soon," though he said he had not talked to Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., about getting on the schedule. He said he has talked to Democrats about the idea both this year and in past years. The bill has no co-sponsors yet.
"I just think that if you look at the number of jobs we have lost, particularly, good-paying, blue-collar jobs, manufacturing jobs, it's in the millions since 1999, and their accession to the World Trade Organization in 2000. So I think the facts are pretty clear in terms of what this policy has cost us and cost our workers," Hawley said. "It's also made us dependent on their medical supply chains, and I think it's pretty hard ... to make the case that they ought to be getting what is a very, very, very favorable trade treatment from us, when they are behaving the way they are, when they are openly spying on us with their balloons, and they're doing the TikTok, and when they've decimated our manufacturing sector. That would be my case."
"A lot of people 20 years ago were right about this -- no one more so than the unions." he added. "The unions warned about this in the '90s -- they said this will decimate our manufacturing sector. All of these free-trade Republicans said: 'Oh, no, it's going to be fine.' It was a disaster."