Let’s Talk Tariffs with Jamie Rodgers: Section 338 Import Bans, a Changing 50% Tariff List & New Copper Rules

Your weekly coffee chat on tariffs & trade.

I was starting to wonder where you go after a 50% tariff.

Apparently, the answer is: stop letting the product into the country altogether.

Last week, the White House announced new Section 338 import bans on certain Canadian products, including goods in the dairy, alcohol and motor vehicle categories. The bans are scheduled to take effect September 29. At the same time, the list of Canadian products subject to the existing 50% Section 338 duties changed again, with some products added and others removed effective September 15.

There’s a lot happening here, but I think the bigger story is how quickly we’ve moved from talking about tariffs as an added cost to talking about whether certain goods can enter the country at all.

What Caught My Eye

The Section 338 escalation is obviously the headline.

A 50% tariff can dramatically change the economics of an import. An outright ban changes the conversation completely. There’s no landed-cost calculation that solves for a product you can’t bring into the country.

That’s an important distinction for businesses.

When tariffs increase, companies have options to evaluate. They can look at pricing, sourcing, classification, duty recovery opportunities, inventory strategy and whether the economics still make sense.

When imports are prohibited, the list gets considerably shorter.

And this isn’t happening in isolation. The administration also modified the scope of the 50% Section 338 tariffs, adding some Canadian products and removing others. CBP confirmed those changes apply to goods entered for consumption, or withdrawn from warehouse for consumption, beginning September 15.

That makes tariff exposure something companies have to keep reviewing, not something they can calculate once and put in a spreadsheet.

A SKU that wasn’t affected yesterday may be affected today. A product that was subject to an additional duty may come off the list. And now, in certain cases, a tariff can become a prohibition.

That’s a very different environment to operate in.

Here’s My Take

One thing I’ve learned from decades in this industry is that businesses generally adapt pretty well when they know the rules.

The harder part is when the rules keep moving.

That’s why I think companies need to get away from thinking about tariffs solely as a purchasing or customs issue. At this point, trade policy can affect sourcing, inventory, pricing, contracts and ultimately whether a product can move through the supply chain at all.

Trade policy can change faster than a supply chain can.

You can change a tariff proclamation overnight. You cannot necessarily qualify a new supplier, shift production, renegotiate contracts and move inventory halfway around the world overnight.

That gap is where a lot of the risk sits.

If It Were My Business…

I’d be looking further ahead than the next tariff effective date.

If I relied heavily on Canadian goods in categories that have already been targeted, I’d want to understand what happens if the scope changes again.

Which products are exposed? Which suppliers are difficult to replace? How much inventory do we have? Where could we source alternatively? And how long would that transition realistically take?

I wouldn’t necessarily change the entire supply chain tomorrow.

But I’d want the answers before I needed them.

And while everyone is understandably watching Canada, there was another update this week that I wouldn’t overlook.

CBP began rejecting certain copper entry summaries when required primary country of smelt and country of cast information is missing. ACE now returns a fatal F794 error when the required record isn’t submitted for affected classifications.

Not exactly the headline that dominates the morning news.

It may, however, be the headline that stops your entry.

That’s a good reminder that some of the most consequential customs changes aren’t always the biggest stories.

One for the Road

I’m watching what happens between now and September 29, when the new Canadian import bans are scheduled to take effect.

But I’m also watching the broader pattern.

Over the last several weeks, we’ve gone from new duties, to retaliation, to revised tariff lists, and now to import bans.

For businesses, I think the lesson is pretty straightforward:

Don’t build your trade strategy around the assumption that today’s rules will still be tomorrow’s rules.

Know where your exposure is, know what your alternatives are, and give yourself enough time to use them.

See you next week.

Jamie Rodgers
CEO, J.M. Rodgers Co.