Commerce Spending Bill Dedicates $3 Million to Section 232 Exclusion Staffing

The mini-Omnibus bill to fund a quarter of the government -- including the Commerce Department -- dedicated $3 million more for the Bureau of Industry and Security than was spent in the last fiscal year, for a total of $118,050,000. The White House had asked for $120 million, with a little over $4 million of that for Section 232 exclusions, to hire 13 staffers and subcontractors to handle the flood of requests. The conferees said that they agreed to language "to ensure that the additional resources above enacted for BIS are devoted to an effective Section 232 exclusion process."

When the Section 232 tariffs were implemented, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross asked Congress to approve an internal transfer of funds of $3.3 million, which it did. In addition to the funding, the bill requires that the department give quarterly reports to the committees that oversee it -- within 15 day of the end of the quarter -- on the number of exclusions approved, the number of exclusions denied, the number of exclusions received, staffing on the exclusion, and "the status of efforts to assist small- and medium-sized businesses in navigating the exclusion process." The spending bill is expected to pass both chambers Feb. 14.