Republicans state that the administration by dropping digital trade demands is allowing the EU and CCP to discriminate against US businesses and tax them at will.
Reuters reports that U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai has dropped longstanding U.S. digital trade demands during World Trade Organization talks.
The U.S. is withdrawing proposals made in 2019 by the Trump administration, insisting that WTO e-commerce rules allow free cross-border data flows and prohibit national requirements for data localization and reviews of software source code.
The official said U.S. policy must consider regulatory objectives, “balancing the right to regulate in the public interest and the need to address anticompetitive behavior in the digital economy,” according to a transcript seen by Reuters.
Free flow surrenders to EU and CCP regulations. Foreign countries can limit US businesses’ ability to compete with them. They can tax or fine them.
House Ways and Means Chairman Jason Smith (R-Mo.) said Tai’s withdrawal “surrenders the playing field to the Chinese Communist Party and abandons our closest trading partners.”
“USTR’s decision to abandon important, longstanding, and bipartisan U.S. digital trade priorities at the WTO runs contrary to American interests,” said Reps. LaHood and DelBene. “Instead of promoting policies that Congress set in the bipartisan U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement that protect against the forced transfer of American technology, enable the free flow of information across borders, and defend American industries, small businesses, and workers against discrimination, USTR has unilaterally decided to walk away from these important rules without the consent of Congress.
He said it helps the CCP.
This decision provides more leverage for other foreign powers, including the Chinese Communist Party, to write the rules of the global digital economy into the future. We strongly urge the Biden administration to reconsider its approach.”
Congress needs to fight this, but will they?
America Last?
Grover Norquist notes that this is another ‘America Last’ policy we’ve seen in the “Digital Services Tax” and regulations such as the “Digital Services Act” [an anti-free speech act] and “Digital Markets Act.” They “are explicitly designed to fleece American companies while exempting their European counterparts,” Norquist said in an article for The DCNF.
DSA/DMA Concerns for US Businesses:
The EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said she is bringing European [socialist] values to the global digital world, [and she’s also looking to fleece US businesses and kill US creativity and innovation.]
Who holds you accountable? You weren’t even elected.
— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) August 26, 2023
“A 2022 study estimated that new DMA and DSA regulations would force American companies to pay between $22 and $50 billion in new compliance costs, borne by American households already suffering under high inflation,” Norquist noted.
Canada Can Fleece Us Too?
As Norquist wrote, “In December, Justin Trudeau told the media that President Biden had no concerns with a new Canadian tax on mainly American streaming services. There was also no opposition from the Biden administration about Canadian content quotas harming American streaming companies.”
That’s confirmed in several publications. It goes along with their idea of a “sharing economy.”
The Biden administration also welcomed the Paris-based OECD’s “Global Minimum Tax” regime, effectively ending tax competition and making it impossible for the U.S. to compete.
Remember when Barack Obama said America is not exceptional? We won’t be.
