Bernd Janzen Quoted by Marketplace on Steel Import Exclusion Requests
Contact:
Akin Gump international trade partner Bernd Janzen has been quoted in a piece on American Public Radio’s Marketplace concerning exclusion requests filed by U.S. companies seeking to import steel products without paying the new Trump administration-imposed tariffs.
The segment, “To exempt or not: How the Commerce Department decides who pays steel tariffs,” focused on the decision-making process at Commerce by which requests for exemptions are filed—and, in many cases, challenged by U.S. steel producers.
Janzen, whose practice includes advising clients on antidumping and countervailing duty proceedings before Commerce, said of documents provided him by Marketplace that had been obtained via FOIA channels, “The documents … show that there is machinery for making those decisions, but we still don't know how the judgement calls are being made internally.”
A considerable amount of information regarding evaluation of exemption requests and objects on the pages obtained had been blacked out, leading Janzen to note, “The redactions are quite significant.”
