Trump's decision to tee up new tariffs on between $50 billion and $60 billion of Chinese imports in retaliation for the nation's purported strong-arming of U.S. intellectual property is the White House's boldest maneuver yet against Beijing, and top Republicans like Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, will be keeping a close eye on how the plan is implemented.
"While I commend the administration for taking much-needed action toward China, I am concerned with their approach on tariffs," Hatch said in a statement. "Hitting billions in goods with tariffs runs the risk of putting a bigger dent in the pocketbooks of American families across the country. The administration must pursue action resulting from this investigation as part of a comprehensive strategy to address China's rampant abuse against American innovation."
The administration's response to China's controversial IP practices — which have been a thorn in the side of U.S. businesses for years — is three-fold.
First, U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer will within 15 days draft a list of about 1,300 proposed Chinese goods to hit with new levies as a response to China's policies requiring U.S. firms to hand over sensitive technology as a condition for market access.
The president also advised USTR to consider filing a World Trade Organization case against China challenging policies that give more favorable IP licensing deals to Chinese companies than those given to foreign investors.
Beyond the mere trading of goods, the U.S. is also looking to make it more difficult for China to invest in the U.S. Details on this point remain murky, but the U.S. Treasury Department will within 60 days come forward with new rules meant to keep state-run Chinese companies from scooping up sensitive U.S. IP.
As was the case when the administration unveiled its similarly contentious duties on steel and aluminum, Democratic lawmakers like House Ways and Means Committee Ranking Member Richard Neal, D-Mass., raised concerns about the policy's overall lack of clarity.
"We still don't know what tariffs will be imposed or whether investment restrictions will be made," Neal said. "We also don't know whether the actions, when the administration finally decides on them, will be effective. There is no doubt that action has been needed on these problems for a long time. Today's announcement leaves us with more questions than answers."
On the private sector side, the Business Roundtable chided the administration for pursuing tariffs "without a long-term strategy to bring about reforms in China," and instead urged the White House to build a coalition of allies that will put pressure on Beijing to make changes.
But the USTR report that laid the groundwork for Trump's actions Thursday went to great lengths to point out that high-level commercial dialogues and summits stretching back to the Bush administration have not been successful in getting meaningful concessions from China.
In the type of partisan subversion that has come to color the Trump administration's trade policy, the AFL-CIO had mostly positive things to say about the move, though the union was clear that any new tariffs would need to be part of a broader strategy.
"While we will be reviewing the full Section 301 report in the coming days to ensure these proposed tariffs appropriately target the industries that have lost production, wages and jobs to predatory intellectual property violations, we agree that now is the time to act," AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said. "In coordination with allies and as part of comprehensive trade reform, these tariffs will put needed pressure on China to play fair."
--Editing by Nicole Bleier.
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