Element Electronics, in an emailed statement Tuesday, stopped well short of committing to close its Winnsboro, South Carolina, LCD TV assembly factory to escape the higher costs of the 25 percent Trade Act Section 301 tariffs on LCD panel imports from China being proposed on a third tranche of duties. The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative released its final list Tuesday in the second tranche of 25 percent duties, those to take effect Aug. 23 (see 1808080028). A Columbia, South Carolina, newspaper reported Tuesday that Element will close the plant in October and terminate its remaining 126 employees (see 1808070010). The “teammates” who work at Winnsboro “are at risk of layoff as a result of the trade-war related tariffs on our television parts,” said Element in the statement. “As we are the only USA assembler of televisions, we believe the inclusion of our parts on the list of affected products is accidental and resolvable.” Element is “working hard to have our parts removed from the tariff list and we remain hopeful that the closure of our South Carolina factory will be avoided,” said the company. “Until then, everyone at Element, especially the potentially impacted teammates at the factory, are completely committed to business-as-usual at an otherwise thriving Element.” Just "simply the announcement" July 10 of the proposed tariffs on LCD panels from China “triggered the need” for immediate factory cutbacks because of the likely impact the duties would have on the supply chain, said Element last month (see 1807200056).

Tech interests virtually struck out in their attempts to persuade U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer to spare their products and components from a second tranche of 25 percent Trade Act Section 301 tariffs on imports from China. Despite heavy industry lobbying to exclude semiconductors and other key parts from the second round of new levies, the list Lighthizer released Tuesday contains 279 tariff lines of goods worth about $16 billion in trade value, a mere 2 percent reduction from 284 lines in the originally proposed list released June 15 (see 1806150030). The new tariffs will take effect Aug. 23, said Lighthizer, who soon will announce a "process" for seeking exclusions from the new duties.

Tech interests virtually struck out in their attempts to persuade U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer to spare their products and components from a second tranche of 25 percent Trade Act Section 301 tariffs on imports from China. Despite heavy industry lobbying to exclude semiconductors and other key parts from the second round of new levies, the list Lighthizer released Tuesday contains 279 tariff lines of goods worth about $16 billion in trade value, a mere 2 percent reduction from 284 lines in the originally proposed list released June 15 (see 1806150030). The new tariffs will take effect Aug. 23, said Lighthizer, who soon will announce a "process" for seeking exclusions from the new duties.

Posted comments on the Trump administration’s proposed third round of Trade Act Section 301 tariffs on Chinese imports surpassed 600 Tuesday in docket USTR-2018-0026. Virtually all were filed by the original July 27 deadline for requests to appear at four days of public hearings beginning Aug. 20.

The Trump administration’s proposed Trade Act Section 301 tariffs on Chinese goods imported to the U.S. under the Harmonized Tariff Schedule’s 8517.62.00 subheading targets equipment “critical for the build-out of high-speed broadband internet” and related IoT technologies, said the Telecommunications Industry Association in comments posted Saturday in docket USTR-2018-0026. The comments were filed July 27, when 10 percent tariffs were still on the table, days before U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer announced he will “consider” hiking the duties to 25 percent (see 1808010018).

The Trump administration’s proposed Trade Act Section 301 tariffs on Chinese goods imported to the U.S. under the Harmonized Tariff Schedule’s 8517.62.00 subheading targets equipment “critical for the build-out of high-speed broadband internet” and related IoT technologies, said the Telecommunications Industry Association in comments posted Saturday in docket USTR-2018-0026. The comments were filed July 27, when 10 percent tariffs were still on the table, days before U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer announced he will “consider” hiking the duties to 25 percent (see 1808010018).

The Trump administration’s proposed Trade Act Section 301 tariffs on Chinese goods imported to the U.S. under the Harmonized Tariff Schedule’s 8517.62.00 subheading targets equipment “critical for the build-out of high-speed broadband internet” and related IoT technologies, said the Telecommunications Industry Association in comments posted Saturday in docket USTR-2018-0026. The comments were filed July 27, when 10 percent tariffs were still on the table, days before U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer announced he will “consider” hiking the duties to 25 percent (see 1808010018).

International Trade Today is providing readers with some of the top stories for July 30 - Aug. 3 in case they were missed.

The Office of the United States Trade Representative released the final list for the second tranche of Section 301 tariffs on Aug. 7. CBP will begin the collection an extra 25 percent in tariffs on those goods from China starting Aug. 23, the USTR said in its announcement.

Written comments and post-hearing rebuttals are due Sept. 6 on the third round of the Trump administration’s proposed Trade Act Section 301 tariffs on Chinese imports, after U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer said Wednesday he will “consider” hiking the duties to 25 percent from 10 percent (see 1808010018), said his office in a Friday "extended comment period" notice to be published Tuesday in the Federal Register. The agency scrapped its original Aug. 17 deadline for written submissions, extending it to Sept. 6, the same day post-hearing rebuttals are due, having been extended from Aug. 30. It also extended to Aug. 13 the deadline that expired July 27 for filing written requests to appear at four days of public hearings on the proposed tariffs. The scheduled Aug. 20 start date of the hearings “has not changed,” but the hearings may be extended beyond their current Aug. 23 conclusion, “depending on the number of additional interested persons who request to appear,” said the notice. “I have not heard about any additional days added to the schedule for the public testimony,” David Cohen, a trade expert with Sandler Travis, emailed us Friday. “Perhaps before deciding to do so, they will wait until the August 13th deadline to evaluate how many requests ultimately get filed before deciding about expanding the number of days.” Even with hard restrictions limiting each witness to five minutes of oral testimony, it remains to be seen how Lighthizer’s office can possibly accommodate so many witnesses in just four days of hearings, since well more than 400 had filed requests to appear in docket USTR-2018-0026 through Friday, the vast majority saying they want to testify against the tariffs.