According to Reuters, three Democratic senators from auto-manufacturing states in the United States urged the Biden administration on March 7 to increase import tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles to address national security risks, marking the latest effort by US lawmakers to protect the American automotive industry.
Michigan Senators Gary Peters and Debbie Stabenow, along with Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown, wrote a letter to US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo and US Trade Representative Katherine Tai, stating that "allowing heavily subsidized Chinese vehicles into the US market threatens the US automotive manufacturing industry. Inundating the US market with artificially cheap Chinese electric vehicles would result in the loss of thousands of American jobs and jeopardize the survival of the entire US automotive sector."
Automotive industry officials said last month that the Biden administration is considering raising tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles, and this letter is the latest evidence of increasing pressure on the White House to take further action to prevent the importation of Chinese vehicles.
The letter urged the US government to "take additional actions this year to counter the economic and national security threats posed by China's efforts to infiltrate our American markets." Senators also called on the Commerce Department to focus on potential threats, particularly from "highly connected Chinese vehicles and Chinese-controlled high-risk connected and autonomous driving technologies."
The Office of the US Trade Representative (USTR) did not immediately comment on the above information.
Last week, the US Commerce Department initiated an investigation into whether the importation of Chinese vehicles constitutes a national security risk and may impose restrictions due to concerns about "connected" automotive technology.
On March 7, Raimondo stated that the US government is deeply concerned about this issue. "We are identifying risks as quickly as we can and taking actions we think involve national security," Raimondo added, noting that US automotive executives raised the issue with her last year. "If China is subsidizing vehicles in a way that puts US workers at a disadvantage, we have to act."
In recent days, two Republican senators introduced legislation seeking to increase tariffs on Chinese-manufactured vehicles, even though currently, relatively few Chinese vehicles are imported into the United States.
"Chinese policies could flood our markets with their vehicles, posing a risk to our national security," President Joe Biden said in a statement last week. "I won't allow that to happen during my term."
The Chinese Embassy in Washington rejected calls for higher tariffs, stating that China's automotive exports merely "reflect the high-quality development of China's manufacturing industry and strong innovation."
