Although all members of the House Ways and Means Committee supported a bill renewing the Generalized System of Preferences benefits program, the bill proceeded to the House floor on a split bipartisan vote of 17-24 as Democrats unsuccessfully called to include an extension of the Trade Adjustment Assistance for Workers program, which lapsed in 2022.
U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai gave testimony April 17 to the Senate Finance Committee regarding President Joe Biden’s 2024 trade policy agenda. She touched mainly on trade deal enforcement, U.S. exporters’ access to new markets and the USTR’s new stance on digital trade, though she also discussed issues such as forced labor and the upcoming legislation on the Generalized System of Preferences benefits program.
India and the U.S. should aim for "economically meaningful outcomes" from better customs and trade facilitation, supply chain linkages, trade in high-tech products and trade in critical minerals between the two countries, India's commerce minister and U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai said in a joint statement.
Vice President Kamala Harris talked about critical minerals with Indonesia's president and resilient supply chains with him and the president of the Philippines and prime minister of Japan during meetings in Jakarta this week on the sidelines of the biannual meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, or ASEAN Summit.
In more than four hours of questioning during a hearing March 24 before the House Ways and Means Committee, no member of Congress advocated for lessening tariffs on Chinese goods under Section 301, or for reopening exclusions applications.
The top Republican on the Senate Finance Committee said renewing the Generalized System of Preferences benefits program and the Miscellaneous Tariff Bill didn't happen last year because Democrats pushed "social policy and environmental policy in MTB and GSP."
Rep. Adrian Smith, R-Neb., who was the top Republican on the House Ways and Means Trade Subcommittee, will take the chairmanship of the subcommittee now that Republicans are in the majority. The announcement was made Jan. 26. He issued a statement that said American consumers and producers are sitting on "the sidelines of the global economy because of the Biden administration’s failure to put forward a proactive trade agenda."
U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai and Indian Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal did not announce any breakthroughs after their Jan. 11 meeting, but their joint statement pointed to some trade irritants that might be resolved in the future.
A negotiating mandate from the European Council was agreed to on Dec. 20 by "EU member states' ambassadors" over the revised Generalized Scheme of Preferences regulation, which gives trade preferences to developing countries, the council announced. The new GSP largely upholds the "main features of the current system, but includes some improvements," including "stronger links" for human rights and the environment and improved monitoring and transparency of the scheme. A new link will be established between the trade preferences given to a country and their "cooperation on migration and the readmission of own nationals illegally present in the EU," the council said.
The top Republican on the House Ways and Means Committee said Republican and Democratic staff on the committee "haven’t had extensive discussions on GSP and MTB, and won't, my sense is, as long as there’s an insistence on [linking them to renewing] Trade Adjustment Assistance."