Washington D.C., Oct. 14, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Following on from President Biden’s meeting and constructive efforts to help get America’s supply chain moving again, the Coalition of American Chassis Manufactures sent a letter to the President calling on the Administration to maintain antidumping (“AD”) and countervailing duty (“CVD”) tariffs on imports of intermodal container chassis from China. The letter notes that since the imposition of the orders, America’s chassis manufacturers have hired hundreds of new workers, with plans to hire hundreds more, invested millions of dollars to increase production and capacity, and increased production and capacity by over 400% with additional planned expansions.
Please see the full text of the letter to President Biden below:
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Coalition of American Chassis Manufacturers
October 13, 2021
President Joseph R. Biden
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
The White House
Washington, D.C., 20500
Dear President Biden:
On behalf of the Coalition of American Chassis Manufacturers, which represents all intermodal container chassis manufacturing in the United States and thousands of American workers in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Alabama, Michigan, South Carolina, and Wisconsin, we strongly support the efforts you outlined today to address the challenges at ports across the country. While constructive efforts outlined in today’s White House meeting are constructive and will help to get America’s supply chain moving again, the port director’s letter released yesterday suggesting that the antidumping (“AD”) and countervailing duty (“CVD”) tariffs on imports of intermodal container chassis from China be removed as part of the effort to unclog the bottleneck at the Nation’s ports is misguided, wrong, and should be rejected. The administration should not be taken in by this smokescreen. This is no solution at all and would only serve to re-injure American manufacturers and their workers who suffered significant material injury at the hands of unfairly traded Chinese chassis.
For decades, American’s domestic chassis manufacturers and their workers were forced to compete against one of China’s largest and most heavily subsidized state-owned entities, CIMC. As a result, American chassis manufacturers were nearly wiped out. Not until the industry fought back and asked the Department of Commerce and International Trade Commission to investigate these unfair trade practice, which ultimately led to the imposition of the current AD and CVD orders, has the industry finally been able to begin to recover all that has been lost to the Chinese Government’s interference.
Since the imposition of the orders, America’s chassis manufacturers have hired hundreds of new workers, with plans to hire hundreds more, invested millions of dollars to increase production and capacity, and increased production and capacity by over 400% with additional planned expansions. None of this would be possible without the remedial relief afforded by these orders.
Make no mistake, some of the port directors that signed the letter to the Administration either have been purchasing or have plans to purchase unfairly traded Chinese chassis to supply chassis pools at their ports. Now, some of those same port directors are asking the Administration to turn a blind eye to China’s unfair trade practices and re-injure a domestic industry that is vital to America’s supply chain so the leasing companies that run the pools at the ports or the ports themselves can continue to purchase unfairly traded Chinese chassis. Not only is this request self-serving, but it will not fix the problems at America’s ports.
The problems at America’s ports are systemic and in part are as a result of allowing China to dominate the supply of equipment that supports America’s supply chain. The systemic problems at the ports result from lack of available dock space to accommodate a surge of container ships carrying Chinese goods, lack of available warehousing space, and a shortage of workers to unload cargo ships. Through state-controlled major shipping lines and equipment suppliers, the Chinese Government can bend shipping supply chains to serve its national priorities. For example, the same Chinese SOE, CIMC, controls virtually all the supply of ocean shipping containers and its ocean carrier SOE parents are prioritizing sending empty containers back to China to fill with more goods to keep flooding the U.S. market rather than export U.S. agricultural products. As a result, those U.S. agricultural exports take longer to export, increasing the time full containers of products sit on chassis at the docks waiting to be exported. This practice puts American exports at a disadvantage.
Let us be clear—the way to solve these problems is not on the backs of American manufacturers and their workers. Tragically, removing the tariffs will only cause more American workers to lose their jobs without fixing the root cause of the supply chain problems.
Rather than taking ownership of systemic problems and offering workable solutions, some of America’s port directors would rather hurt domestic chassis manufacturing, while helping to extend China’s domination over our ports and supply chain. We cannot let America’s chassis manufacturing be the scapegoat for a host of other supply chain issues.
The U.S. chassis industry is rebuilding and creating thousands of new, good-paying, family sustaining jobs. We ask that you support domestic chassis manufacturing and the communities we represent, creating more American manufacturing jobs as we work together to Build Back Better.
Sincerely,
Name: Robert Wahlin
Title: President & CEO, Stoughton Trailers LLC
Name: Kent Musick
Title: President, Pratt Industries, Inc
Name: Justin “JP” Pierson
Title: President, Dorsey Intermodal
Name: Frank Conti
Title: Chief Operating Officer, Hercules Chassis
Name: Frank Katz
Title: CEO & Chairman, Cheetah Chassis Corporation
The Coalition of American Chassis Manufacturers consists of Cheetah Chassis Corporation, Hercules Enterprises, LLC, Pitts Enterprises, Inc., Pratt Industries, Inc., and Stoughton Trailers, LLC.
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