Carnes, Harry, Director, Miami District, U.S. Customs Service, Depart- Chang, Jimmy Chicheng, president, Syntron/Extra Computer Corp Corcoran, George, Assistant Commissioner for Enforcement, U.S. Customs Hecker, Gary A., attorney, on behalf of Apple Computer, Inc.... Liberman, Martin, Supervisory Chemist, U.S. Customs Service, Depart- O'Rourke, Margaret M., Director, Office of Trade Operations, U.S. Cus- toms Service, Department of the Treasury. Parsons, Keith, former employee, Extra Computer Corp. Robbins, Murray H., vice president, Syntron/Extra Computer Corp Schaffer, Robert P., Assistant Commissioner, Office of Commercial Oper- ations, U.S. Customs Service, Department of the Treasury. Von Raab, William, Commissioner, U.S. Customs Service, Department of Material submitted for the record by: Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee: Letters, memoranda, and Abbey, Richard H., Chief Counsel, U.S. Customs Service, to Assistant 372 Airlie conference agenda item "100% By-Pass Test" report.. 186 371 109 American Iron and Steel Institute, letter from Peter B. Mulloney to Anderson, Annelise, Associate Director for Economics and Govern- Assistant Commissioner of Customs to all regional Commissioners, November 20, 1980, re survey of rejected entries, and related docu- Brennan, Frank R., Director, Duty Assessment Division, U.S. Cus- Brennan, Frank R., Director, Duty Assessment Division, U.S. Cus- 16 244 342 Page Material submitted for the record by-Continued Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee-Continued Brennan, Frank R., Director, Duty Assessment Division, U.S. Cus- 347 Commercial enforcement selectivity test, North Central region, Commissioner of Customs to Cora Beebe, Assistant Secretary, March Conroy, A. E. II, Director, Compliance Monitoring Staff, EPA, to Jo DeAngelus, Alfred R.: Correspondence with the Federal Trade Com- DeAngelus, Alfred R., to James W. Hughes, Toxics Economics Staff, DeAngelus, Alfred R., to Kenneth R. Mason, Secretary, U.S. Interna- DeAngelus, Alfred R., to Jeffrey G. Miller Assistant Administrator Dingell, Chairman John D., to Alfred E. Eckes, Jr., Chairman, U.S. Reply Dingell, Chairman John D., to James C. Miller III, Chairman, Feder- Gray, John R., Assistant Director for Classification and Value, Hackett, C.C., Jr., Assistant Commissioner, U.S. Customs Service, to Hecker, Gary A., attorney, Blakely, Sokoloff, Taylor & Zafman, to Houston, Donald L., Administrator, Food Safety and Inspection Serv- 189 139 328 304 254 306 43 310 48, 367 51 260 282 125 316 380 389, 401 Jellinek, Steven D., Assistant Administrator for Pesticides and Toxic Lee, James O., Jr., Acting Administrator, Animal and Plant Health 308 312 268 Lewis, Donald W., Director, Entry Procedures and Penalties Division, Mach, E.H., Customs Directive "Supervision of Foreign Trade Zone 473 279 Mach, E.H., to Special Assistant for Congressional and Public Affairs, 65 Merenda, Joseph, Director, Assessment Division, EPA, to Don Clay, 321 Metzger, Philip, assistant area director, New York Seaport, to all 229 313 Page Material submitted for the record by-Continued Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee-Continued Murphy, Robert W., Assistant District Director, U.S. Customs Neylan, Jack, Head of Strategy Section, EPA, to A.E. Conroy II, O'Rourke, Margaret M., to Assistant Commissioner, Commercial Op- O'Rourke, Margaret M., to Alfred Eckes, Chairman, U.S. Internation- O'Rourke, Margaret M.: Letters to Kenneth R. Mason, Secretary, O'Rourke, Margaret M., memorandum, August 23, 1983, re importa- O'Rourke, Margaret M., to Joseph J. Meranda, Director, Existing 188 315 234 39, 365 55 296 343 344 521 Rostenkowski, Hon. Dan, et al., chairman, Ways and Means Commit- 52 Schaffer, Robert P., to Commissioners and Directors, March 10, 1983, 238 326 Subcommittee memorandum re interview with Keith Parsons August 537 Syscom computer bytes, digit comparison 525 Todhunter, John A., Assistant Administrator for Pesticides and Toxic 319 481 U.S. Customs Service correspondence and documents re Syntron/ 485 Von Raab, William, to Hon. Robert Dole, chairman, Senate Finance 190 Weeren, Victor G., Director, Cargo Processing Division, U.S. Customs 395 345 Wegener, P.F., M.G. Maher & Co., Inc., to Scott Shrieve, Entry Abbey, Richard H., Chief Counsel, U.S. Customs Service, to Commis- Brennan, Frank R., Director, Duty Assessment Division, to Ronald I. DeAngelus, Alfred R., to Assistant Commissioner, Commercial Oper- 134 285 355 DeAngelus, Alfred R., to Peter B. Mulloney, chairman, Committee on 113 Import specialists assigned to steel, table... 107 Mach, E.H.: Customs directive, supervision of foreign trade zone ad- 32 New York Seaport, staffing and bypass charts.... 231 203 Material submitted for the record by-Continued Regan, Donald T., Secretary of the_Treasury, to Donald J. Devine, Page 144 Stockman, David A., Director, OMB, to Anne M. Gorsuch, Adminis- 351 U.S. import value, fiscal year 1983, tables....... 195 UNFAIR FOREIGN TRADE PRACTICES THURSDAY, JULY 26, 1984 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND COMMERCE, SUBCOMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND INVESTIGATIONS, Washington, DC. The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:25 a.m., in room 2123, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. John D. Dingell (chairman) presiding. Mr. DINGELL. The subcommittee will come to order. The Chair apologizes to the witnesses this morning for being late. We had a vote on the floor. Today, we seek answers to the very troubling problems that have been documented by the subcommittee over the last year and a half regarding the flood of illegal imports. The various schemes that constitute customs fraud run the gamut from falsifying the country of origin of the goods to outright smuggling. Those schemes to defraud involve merchandise worth many billions of dollars. They cost jobs, and they cost America its future. The Customs Service now has 420 active class I fraud cases. The entered value of the merchandise in these cases alone is about $2.5 billion. And the class II and class III cases, which are of lesser promise or importance, would come on top of this figure. This staggering sum represents only the fraud that the Customs Service has detected. Because customs physically inspects less than 1 percent of containerized shipments, and since Customs now has a program that accepts whatever value and description the importer or broker declares for 50 percent of most goods, it is obvious that the true magnitude of import fraud is some substantial multiple of the more than $2.5 billion that the records indicate. The inability of the Customs Service to effectively police imports costs the U.S. Treasury untold millions of dollars each year. This is deplorable policy. When it is allowed to happen in the face of record budget deficits, it is unconscionable, particularly in view of the fact that the records of the committee show that each customs employee brings in somewhere between 17 and 20 times the money spent on his or her salary. The total impact on the Treasury, however, is by no means the worst aspect of this problem. The worst part of this problem is that illegal imports, such as steel and textiles, steal jobs from Ameri cans. Illegal imports of counterfeit products, such as drugs, medical devices, and automobile brake linings, directly threaten the health and safety of American consumers. And all types of illegal imports (1) |