Standing Up for Our Farmers
This week, I sent two letters to U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) Ambassador Katherine Tai in defense of American agricultural export markets.
I led 62 of my colleagues in a letter calling on Ambassador Tai to fully utilize the tools USTR has under United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) to hold Mexico accountable to its commitments by proceeding with a formal USMCA dispute to address Mexico’s discriminatory policies banning U.S. biotech corn. Ambassador Tai has been working hard to hold our trading partners to their commitments, but Mexico has not made the necessary changes in their allotted 30 days, so now we must hold them to account. It is time to fully utilize the tools under USMCA and proceed with a formal dispute to stand up for the livelihoods of American farmers.
You can read the full letter here.
I also joined a bipartisan group of colleagues to urge Ambassador Tai to prioritize ethanol export competitiveness and address unfair import tariffs imposed on American ethanol by Brazil. The U.S. has been exporting ethanol to Brazil duty-free until now. The newly imposed 16% tariff rate is going to put our farmers at risk. I look forward to working with the Ambassador to find ways to correct this trade imbalance.
You can read the full letter here. |