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Law360 (March 5, 2021, 7:39 PM EST) -- The Biden administration announced Friday that it is extending tariff waivers on Chinese face masks, gloves and cleaning supplies for another six months as it continues to combat the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative granted a tariff reprieve to 99 Chinese products deemed essential for the nation's virus response in December. Those exclusions were set to lapse at the end of this month, but will now remain in place through September, according to a draft Federal Register notice posted by the USTR.
"In light of the continuing efforts to combat COVID-19, the U.S. Trade Representative has determined that it is inappropriate to allow the exclusions for certain products to lapse," the agency wrote in the notice.
The tariffs stretch back to the Trump administration's protracted pressure campaign against China that began with a rebuke of Beijing's intellectual property and technology transfer policies. The two sides exchanged tariff blows for the better part of two years, with the U.S. eventually applying punitive duties on more than $300 billion worth of Chinese goods.
Early last year, the two sides halted the tariff escalation with a limited-scale trade deal, but most of the duties remain untouched. As the tariffs were introduced, the USTR allowed importers to petition for exclusions for products that could not easily be sourced domestically.
After the COVID-19 pandemic hit the U.S. in mid-March, those exclusion requests began to increasingly target personal protective equipment and other safety gear. After a patchwork of exclusions were granted, the administration looped all COVID-19 response imports into a general exclusion at the end of 2020.
The Biden administration has been coy about its plans for the China tariffs as it undertakes a thorough review of U.S.-China trade policy.
But the administration has vowed to use its trade policy as part of its broader COVID-19 response plan, and the move to keep the tariff exclusions in place was embraced by the business community.
U.S. Chamber of Commerce Senior Vice President John Murphy wrote on Twitter that keeping the exclusions in place was a "pragmatic move that helps pandemic response."
--Editing by Stephen Berg.
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