The Treasury Department should add Chinese technology company Tuya to its Non-Specially Designated National Chinese Military-Industrial Complex Companies List, three Republican senators said. Tuya poses a “national security threat” to the U.S. because of its “significant control” over the international internet-connected market, or Internet of Things, which potentially gives it access to sensitive data on Americans, the senators said in a Sept. 9 letter to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen. They also said Tuya operates under the Chinese government.

The top Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee said the acting head of the Bureau of Industry and Security misrepresented facts in front of a congressional commission last week (see 2109080062), saying he wasn't straightforward about the agency’s “delayed and incomplete” provision of export licensing decisions to Congress. Although BIS Acting Undersecretary Jeremy Pelter told the commission that BIS has complied with all laws regarding the disclosure of licensing information to Congress, Rep. Michael McCaul said the agency hasn’t been transparent.

The Treasury Department should maintain and potentially expand sanctions on the Taliban and third-party entities that support them as the group takes over the Afghan government, Republicans on the House Foreign Affairs Committee wrote in a recent letter to Secretary Janet Yellen. “We urge you and the rest of the Biden Administration to maintain a very healthy dose of skepticism about what the Taliban’s intentions and abilities are,” said the letter, signed by more than 15 members, including Michael McCaul of Texas, the committee’s top Republican. “We must maintain what leverage this administration has left to not only secure the evacuation of our citizens, allies, and Afghan partners from the clutches of a terrorist group, but to prevent another atrocity on American shores like the tragic attacks on 9/11.” The members added that “it is imperative that no sanctions against the Taliban are lifted to ensure our national security and the security of our citizens and partners is protected.”

The previous country of origin labeling (COOL) for beef triggered a dispute among the U.S., Mexico and Canada that the U.S. lost at the World Trade Organization (see 1512070017), leading to retaliatory tariffs, and ultimately, the end of mandatory COOL. Ranchers have repeatedly sought the return of COOL, as they dislike the fact that cattle raised in Canada but slaughtered in the U.S. are labeled as U.S. products. South Dakota's two senators, Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., and Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., announced that they will introduce a new COOL bill next week that will require the U.S. trade representative consulting with the agriculture secretary to develop a new mandatory COOL regime that could withstand scrutiny at the WTO. The agency would have six months to develop the plan and six months to implement it, Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., said. If the USTR does not come up with a plan, an automatic mandatory COOL would begin for beef. “Transparency in labeling benefits both producers and consumers,” Thune said. “Unfortunately, the current beef labeling system in this country allows imported beef that is neither born nor raised in the United States, but simply finished here, to be labeled as a product of the USA. This process is unfair to cattle producers and misleading for consumers. When you see a ‘product of the USA’ label on the grocery store shelf, it should mean just that."

The Commerce Department should investigate the potentially unfair pricing activities of a Chinese drone company that was recently placed on the Entity List, two lawmakers said in an Aug. 31 letter to Secretary Gina Raimondo. Reps. Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill., and Gus Bilirakis, R-Fla., said Shenzhen DJI Sciences and Technologies Ltd., which was added to the Entity List in December (see 2012180039), may have dropped its prices for drones by as much as 70% in 2015, which allowed it to capture a significant share of the U.S. drone market. The lawmakers also said DJI should remain on the Entity List and deserves “additional scrutiny” because its drones have been used for human rights abuses in China. “We ask that DJI remain on the Department’s Entity List and that the Department investigate its pricing of consumer drones which has harmed American consumers,” the letter said. Commerce didn’t comment.

Democratic members of the House Agriculture Committee, including Chairman David Scott, D-Ga., told U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai and the agriculture secretary that they are dissatisfied with progress toward dismantling trade barriers to biotech crops in China and Mexico. Their letter, signed by eight committee members, says that when countries like China and Mexico don't allow the imports of these crops, that decision has "a chilling effect on global adoption and commercialization of new technologies. As a result, farmers at home and abroad are forced to choose between innovative technologies or access to foreign markets."

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce gave advice to Congress in July and August on how to shape legislation that Congress is calling a "polluter import fee," which most call a carbon border adjustment tax. On Sept. 2, it published its reaction to one bill on the table, the Coons-Peters bill, although Senate Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden, D-Ore., has not said that the Coons bill will be the starting point for legislation he wishes to advance as part of the "soft infrastructure package" Congress is trying to write this fall (see 2108100031). Just before leaving for the August recess, Wyden said that the Senate was far from a concrete proposal, and that any proposal must get the support of Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va. Manchin represents a state where coal mining is the third-largest industry.

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, told reporters on a press call that his constituents are saying they're concerned there is a "lack of a trade agenda in this administration." He said that in the months since Katherine Tai was confirmed as U.S. trade representative, "I haven't seen any movement on trade agreements."

Seven Republican senators, led by Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., are asking U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai to restart negotiations with Kenya begun in the last administration, with a goal of signing a free trade agreement. They sent a letter Aug. 20 that argued that a free trade agreement "would build on the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) of 2000, which expires in 2025. ... A U.S.-Kenya FTA would strengthen trade and commercial ties at a time when China and Russia are seeking economic influence across the African continent. The U.S. would ultimately be able to further promote human rights, the rule of law, economic development and positive relations with Kenya and Africa through a FTA."

Rep. Randy Feenstra, R-Iowa, introduced a bill that would require the executive branch to prohibit controlled exports to any country that has acted with "gross negligence with respect to a chemical or biological program," and that gross negligence could come from the government itself, a state-owned enterprise, or a company with "significant material support" from that country's govenrment.