by DRONELIFE Features Editor Jim Magill
The most recent move in the continued battle between parts of the U.S. government and drone manufacturers based in China involves an effort to make those products prohibitively expensive for American consumers.
On Tuesday, March 19 a bipartisan group of U.S. lawmakers sent a letter to 3 executive branch agencies, calling for the Biden administration to substantially increase tariffs and take other steps to dramatically reduce the importation of Chinese-made drones.
Citing the alleged threats to national security posed by drone makers reminiscent of Shenzhen DJI Sciences and Technologies Ltd. and Autel Robotics, Wisconsin Republican Mike Gallagher — chairman of the House Select Committee on the Strategic Competition Between america and the Chinese Communist Party — and Rating Member Raja Krishnamoorthi, Democrat of Illinois, wrote to Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, and U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai.
Gallagher can also be a cosponsor of the Counter CCP Drones Act, a proposal that will prevent any Chinese-manufactured drones from accessing Federal Communications Commission networks, effectively grounding them. Thirteen other members of Congress signed the letter.
The Congress members’ letter demands that the Biden administration take motion “to stop the mass proliferation of a technology within the U.S. market that poses a transparent national and economic security threat.” Along with calling for increasing tariffs on drone imports, the group of lawmakers called for stronger enforcement against Chinese drone manufacturers using third countries to evade tariffs, and placing restrictions on U.S. federal funds getting used to buy Chinese drones.
Firms reminiscent of DJI and Autel Robotics “receive immense subsidies from the Chinese government, enabling Chinese drone makers to overtake 77 percent of the U.S. hobby drone market and over 90 percent of the U.S. industrial drone market.”
This market dominance has left the U.S. vulnerable to national security risks, the legislators warned. “Security flaws, deliberate or not, risk putting U.S. individuals’ data within the hands of the [People’s Republic of China’s] military and intelligence services,” the letter warns. The prolific use of Chinese-manufactured UAVs by U.S. law enforcement departments, government agencies and utility firms “creates risks that these platforms may very well be used to map and transmit sensitive U.S. infrastructure.”
The lawmakers cited recent research that found that DJI drones can transmit their GPS location, in addition to the coordinates of their operators. “The People’s Liberation Army is a possible end-user of this data, on condition that the PRC’s cyberwarfare doctrine advocates conducting cyberattacks against an adversary’s critical infrastructure,” the letter states.
As well as, the members of Congress claimed that there’s increasing evidence that Chinese drone manufacturers are selling dual-use UAVs to Russia in support of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. “Since March of 2022, Customs data shows that the PRC has sent over $32 million value of drones to Russia, including some that were designated in customs as ‘to be used within the special military operation.’”
Current tariff levels deemed insufficient
The lawmakers say the present 25% additional tariff imposed under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974 “has proven insufficient to combat the surge in imports” of Chinese-made UAVs. Section 301 grants the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative the authority to analyze and take motion to implement U.S. rights under trade agreements and reply to certain foreign trade practices.
The letter also alleges that Chinese drone manufacturers have attempted to get across the tariffs by shipping their products through third countries, reminiscent of Malaysia.
“While data shows that imports of UAVs from the PRC fell from over 16,000 units in 2017 to lower than 200 in 2019, this figure has now surged to over 200,000 in 2022,” the letter states. As well as, the lawmakers said that Malaysia, which had no major drone manufacturing capability prior 2022, saw its drone exports to america jump to 242,000 units that 12 months. “In the primary 11 months of 2023 america imported greater than 565,000 drones from Malaysia.”
The U.S. raised tariffs on the import of Chinese-made drones in 2019 as a part of former President Donald Trump’s trade war with China. For industry leader DJI, the increased costs related to the tariffs were passed directly on to its U.S. customers, who saw price increases of around 13% for popular drones reminiscent of the Mavic 2.
The legislators claim that the proliferation of highly subsidized Chinese-made drones put US. drone firms at a competitive drawback. “PRC subsidized UAVs threaten U.S. national security by undermining the expansion of the domestic U.S. drone industry needed to supply the unmanned aerial, surface, and underwater systems which might be critical for our national defense,” they said.