WASHINGTON - Ways and Means Committee Ranking Member Sander Levin (D-MI) and Trade Subcommittee Ranking Member Jim McDermott (D-WA) issued the following statements today after the U.S. House passed legislation to ensure that the Department of Commerce can continue to apply countervailing duty law to non-market economies (NME), such as China. This legislation, H.R. 4105, overturns the decision of the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in GPX v. United States and preserves the validity of the countervailing duty proceedings against imports from China and Vietnam, beginning in 2006. With the House passage the legislation is deemed passed in the Senate and goes to President Obama for his signature.
Levin: “China is tilting the field of competition by not playing by the rules and this bill restores a key instrument for our nation to hold China accountable. Not acting would have been an enormous step backward at a time when we need to fast forward our efforts to rein in China’s abusive trade practices - practices partly responsible for our record $295 billion trade deficit with China. This legislation ensures that tools remain available under U.S. trade law so that manufacturers can fight back against unfair Chinese trade subsidies."
McDermott: “China has been breaking international trade rules and playing the system unfairly for years at our expense. Now our own courts have naively weighed in, requiring the United States to unilaterally disarm in the face of unfairly traded Chinese imports. But today we overturned that U.S. court decision - and stood up for U.S. workers who can win in any fair-and-square competition. I hope this is just a first step toward Congress taking a more assertive approach to China’s unfair trade practices."
