Washington, DC--
At the urging of Congressional Democrats, the Administration has taken action to restrict use of de minimis for low value shipments into the United States to deal with surge of shipments from Chinese e-commerce companies. Today, the White House announced a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking that would exclude from the de minimis exemption all shipments containing products covered by tariffs imposed under Sections 201 or 301 of the Trade Act of 1974, or Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962. See also DHS Workforce on the Frontlines of Biden-Harris Administration’s New Executive Actions to Address Surge in De Minimis Shipments and Protect American Consumers, Workers, and Businesses.
The Administration's action takes place while Congress negotiates which legislation modifying de minimis will move forward. Specifically, Rep. Blumenauer's (D-OR) bill (H.R. 4148) would bar de minimis for shipments from China, but the House Ways and Means Committee already passed a bill (H.R. 7979) that imposes additional requirements for using de minimis. In the Senate, Senator Ron Wyden introduced his own de minimis bill. In a letter to Congress, EMTC has calculated that passage of H.R. 4148 would impose an additional cost of $111 Billion on e-sellers and approximately $7.3 Billion for sourcing and consumers purchasing goods from China.
EMTC has worked with a number of leading trade associations to support a study by Oxford Economics showing that implementation of the leading legislation aimed at weakening the de minimis exemption would require billions in new Congressional spending each year. The de minimis exemption is a long-standing feature of U.S. law that allows low-value goods (under $800) to come into the US without paying import taxes that cost the government more to collect than they raise. This study is in addition to the recent research "Destroying De Minimis" by American Action Forum.
