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Suspension of the de minimis administrative exemption for imports $800 or less

140 pointsby 5h agopersonalimportation.org
87 comments
1h agoHN ↗

VERY difficult to read. It seems almost everything important is hidden in the details somewhere.

I read a lot of it - enjoy reading the butt-covering “legal justifications” written in explaining why there was no public comment period, etc.

4h agoHN ↗

It truly boggles the mind how Trump managed to sell tariffs as anything other than a tax on American consumers

3h agoHN ↗

He gets away with it because a lot of right-wing elites _love_ the idea of taxing consumption rather than income (or, heaven forbid, wealth).

Additionally, Trump, Hassett, etc are still blaming Biden for inflation caused by the tariffs... and a lot of their base would rather believe that than admit that they got suckered by an obvious scam.

3h agoHN ↗

Trump, Hassett, etc are still blaming Biden for inflation caused by the tariffs

I'm starting to see this backfire with a lot of "personal responsibility" type old-school republicans to whom I talk. They're getting fed up with the administration just blanket blaming anything bad on Biden. Whether that will translate to actual political change, I do not know. But I found it interesting that I'm hearing the frustration more lately.

3h agoHN ↗

Narrator: It did NOT translate to actual political change.

2h agoHN ↗

It doesn't need to translate to actual political change. It needs to translate to them staying at home instead of enthusiastically voting for more sadistic traitorous insanity.

Which is looking quite likely.

Although it does assume there are no peculiar and unexpected anomalies with the vote counting.

2h agoHN ↗

It will not because there are still immigrants and trans people to hate.

2h agoHN ↗

He doesn't actually "get away" with it. A lot of people, left and right, are unhappy about tariffs. But for now, he controls the executive, so it is what it is.

2h agoHN ↗

This is entirely in the “rights” control right now, any of them “unhappy” with it are outliers.

2h agoHN ↗

We'll have to wait and see how many of those outliers end up voting, and how.

2h agoHN ↗

His core base (a solid 25-50% of the party) would rather die than vote for a democrat and all this DSA scare mongering is only entrenching them further/pulling the more moderate among them back into the fold.

The blue wave will likely be a result of blue turnout and some small number of red sitting at home. And sadly the senate is still a toss up

41m agoHN ↗

As I like to say to my fellow blue friends who don’t seem to understand this “what would Joe Biden have to have done for you to vote for Trump”

2h agoHN ↗

The problem is it was never an executive power to begin with. The unitary executive theory pushed by the Heritage Foundation is counter to everything the US was founded on. Decisions from the current SCOTUS are questionable given the conflicts of interest with certain spouses and the endless improper gifts.

1h agoHN ↗

It's silly to claim that a lot of people on the right are unhappy about tariffs.

When Obama put a tariff on Chinese tires, right-wingers (correctly) argued that it was a bad idea that caused American consumers to pay almost a million dollars per "job saved" in the tire industry.

Today the right is in control of the executive, the legislative, the judicial, and and far more news media and... basically just crickets.

As for "he controls the executive". Bullshit. When a Democrat is in office, right-wingers remember that the President is not a king.

Please don't "both sides" this extremely one-sided attack on the American worker.

2h agoHN ↗

A lot of his base believe his lie that the other countries are paying the tariffs.

His followers are literally beyond reason and will accept anything he says. It's so very depressing.

2h agoHN ↗

Populists of all stripes love tariffs and the illusory promise of autarky. We didn’t see Biden remove any of Trump 1’s tariffs and not a single Democrat in congress has committed to repealing the tariffs.

2h agoHN ↗

If that were true, the Republicans would implement a VAT. Trump is legitimately just a moron with a cult of personality.

2h agoHN ↗

managed to sell tariffs

He didn't manage to sell them. Everyone hates the tariffs, which are widely understood to have contributed to high prices and economic stagnation.

What he did manage to do is bully the abjectly servile GOP leaders of Congress into not doing anything about the tariffs, even though setting trade policy is expressly assigned to Congress by Article I of the Constitution, and Trump has repeatedly exceeded any legal authority.

1h agoHN ↗

Nope, Congress has authorized the executive to impose tariffs multiple times for multiple different reasons. Tariff Act of '30, Trade Expansion Act of '62, Trade Act of '74, etc.

53m agoHN ↗

SCOTUS ruled that his initial attempts at tariffs were illegal. He's used an entirely different part of the US code to try again (whether it stands is currently unclear; of course, the question of precisely who received the refunds for his previous illegal effort has received astoundingly little attention).

Your comment begins "Nope, Congress has authorized ..." which just supports the point of the GP that it is Congress that controls the setting of tariffs, even if that may sometimes mean delegating it to the executive branch.

1h agoHN ↗

He campaigned and won on tariffs. A plurality of Americans favor them, evidently.

52m agoHN ↗

We are a country of laws, and the SCOTUS ruled that his first attempt at tariffs was illegal. Whether or not a plurality or majority of Americans favor them is largely irrelevant.

45m agoHN ↗

Whether it's illegal or not is irrelevant to the comment I was responding to, which incorrectly claimed "He didn't manage to sell them. Everyone hates the tariffs".

He campaigned and won with tarrifs as one of his main policy points. Voters favour them. Americans get tarrifs because Americans want tarrifs. Deal with it.

4h agoHN ↗

goes into effect 12 days before a midterm election that is already starting to look like a blue tsunami.

It's a bold strategy, Cotton. Let's see if it pays off for 'em.

3h agoHN ↗

Never interrupt your enemy when they are busy making a mistake.

2h agoHN ↗

Never assume your enemy is making a mistake either, unless you possess the gift of perfect knowledge.

17m agoHN ↗

Hard to see how making things more expensive for consumers is not a mistake, but I could totally be missing something.

2h agoHN ↗

"The compliance date for 19 CFR 145.12(a)(2)(v) and (vi) is on October 22, 2026"

1h agoHN ↗

wait until you find out what month is before november lol

2h agoHN ↗

10 years of believing your color coded wave of choice is going to happen and still winding up with a 50-50 senate

the seats necessary to alter that aren't even open, how gullible do people have to be? well, not very, independents are the largest bloc now, but of the remaining partisans... hello? your algorithm is fake

1h agoHN ↗

a 51% Senate gets to do agency appointments, judge appointments, and particularly SCOTUS

but it cant pass any laws. they’re still cooked by the filibuster (until they get bored of it)

32m agoHN ↗

'Kamala is no different than Trump, and she didn't earn your vote, you should just stay home' vibes.

We have learned Kamala was in fact much, much different than Trump, and many peoples rights have been trampled because of this sort of nonsense fatalism.

3h agoHN ↗

The people in charge betting they only need to count the "red" ballots this time?

3h agoHN ↗

That’s not what it says. It’s still legal. You just have to pay duties. It’s also not just on medication. They shared these rules a while ago too.

2h agoHN ↗

Canadian pharmacies already pay tariffs. What does this actually change?

2h agoHN ↗

Your comment is nonsense.

Canadian pharmacies pay Canadian tariffs. Americans pay American tariffs. American importers are no longer exempted from paying American tariffs applied by the US government for goods de minimis goods they import from Canada.

This post is about American importers no longer having exemption on tariffs they would have otherwise paid to the US government.

At no point has Canadian pharmacies ever paid American tariffs. This is fiction you invented.

2h agoHN ↗

I don’t know what you’re saying, but for those confused. Starting in 2025, the de minimis exception was removed. This added delays to purchases of drugs from Canada to the US, and required consumers to pay new duties. These duties were collected by the pharmacies at order time, or at least my experience was that the pharmacies would charge your card for them. This is the common sense understanding of what I said above.

These duties were annoying but bearable. However these new changes will effectively shut down all consumer orders of drugs from Canada starting on Oct 22. So if you need these drugs to stay alive, order them right now.

PS This new rule is going to put my family’s health at risk and I’m deeply pissed about it. Having some HNer pick this moment for pedantry is incredibly on brand.

2h agoHN ↗

This is the common sense understanding of what I said above.

It's very dangerous to assume common understanding here when Trump has been loudly claiming the opposite, i.e. that the tariffs would be paid by the sender rather than the importer. It would have been more accurate to state that "Canadian pharmacies have already been including the tarrifs in the total order cost".

1h agoHN ↗

Nobody is being a pedant. How you phrased it is wrong and, more importantly, politically charged.

36m agoHN ↗

As a Canadian that sells products to the US I can say that we absolutely pay tariffs to the US government in place of our customers who should be paying it, depending on what shipping provider you use. USPS doesn't have the infrastructure or care to collect tariffs, so they won't, meaning the shipper has to just pay them up front and either jack the shipping cost by an arm-and-a-leg or just eat the cost. Canada Post even requires you as the shipper to pay them. If I ship UPS I can have the buyer pay upon delivery. It's 100% bullshit. I'm luckily under CUSMA, but the first month of tariffs when no one knew what was going on I paid out the ass on shipping and never got any refunds for it like Americans supposedly did, I just got fucked. In Canada and most other places it's normal to pay tariffs and duties when you order anything international (upon delivery) and all carriers know how to collect at delivery (or collect ahead of time online), but the US does not and it's alien to them (as seen by many customers screaming bloody murder over a $4 duty fee that anyone else in the world would kill to only have to pay).

2h agoHN ↗

Well... the legal route is no longer "far cheaper" than domestic supply.

3h agoHN ↗

Various pharmacies in Canada will accept a US prescription and send you the medication via mail, usually at far cheaper than what you would pay for the same in the US.

This prevents it.

2h agoHN ↗

Interesting. Got some examples of the pharmacies?

2h agoHN ↗

Okay Kash, you almost got him this time.

1h agoHN ↗

It’ll likely be a rep hit but - I’d argue livestock imports and booze imports over pharma would be Kash’s interest.

3h agoHN ↗

Is this even in CBP's wheelhouse or is this another egregious overreach?

3h agoHN ↗

this is their thing, yeah.

the C in CBP, "Customs", is specifically this kind of stuff.

2h agoHN ↗

Congress appears to have ceded their oversight role

If there is one most-bipartisan-thing-ever, ceding oversight is it. ex:FastTrack Trade

3h agoHN ↗

There's nothing in the CBP rule that prohibits importing prescriptions, although there will no longer be a duty exemption for them. The rule is about suspending the 'de minimis' exemption for shipments valued under $800...

2h agoHN ↗

Wasn't that already suspended in, like, 2025?

2h agoHN ↗

I believe it had a phased rollout, which impacts all parcels soon.

1h agoHN ↗

I was charged $46 of import fees on a $137 of art supplies from the Czech Republic this May.

57m agoHN ↗

SCOTUS ruled that the executive order that included it was illegal. So it went away, even though they never ruled on the specifics of the de minimis system. Now it is back, under a different EO.

1h agoHN ↗

Starting Oct 22, packages from foreign and Canadian online pharmacies will be prohibited from entering the U.S. if the same medication is sold domestically or if the foreign pharmacy targets U.S. buyers.

3h agoHN ↗

I flagged this and wanted to explain my reasoning.

At the time of writing, the article states something that its own link doesn't support (i.e. it is inaccurate). CBP hasn't "suspended all personal prescription importation." What they've done is removed De Minimis Exemption (i.e. duty free below $800), and that's it. Meaning you can still important personal medication before and after Oct 22nd, what has changed is that now it is subject to normal duty.

Do I think this is bad for people importing personal medication? Absolutely I do, and I oppose it. However, I don't think misstating the argument is constructive nor warranted. You could make the argument using the facts on the ground, and then re-state that in the thread title.

So the story is worthy of discussion, and interesting (even the personal medication POV). But this link and this title aren't "it." Hopefully we can get a higher quality source and title on this topic.

2h agoHN ↗

It's not as simple as "You will now pay duty." Senders will be required to pay bond, and there will be a crushing load of new paperwork. Combined with extra duty, that will have the same effect as an outright ban.

This will be financially catastrophic for many Americans who may suddenly have to find hundreds of dollars a month.

1h agoHN ↗

That's standard operating procedure for any non-de-minimis importer. The $800 limit was only imposed in 2016, historically it was a lot lower than that.

2h agoHN ↗

Trump is trying to trade the petro dollar and opec for Venezuelan oil that will tank the dollar and make debt unpayable (every advisor has said this), how he's trying to make medicine unaffordable before alternatives are ready. Sheesh.

Every use case for tarrifs include got subsidy and small trade barriers so it can grow with market share.

2h agoHN ↗

Hasn't it effectively been suspended for over a year now?

2h agoHN ↗

Yes, and it has driven the decline of Temu and Shein

2h agoHN ↗

This is actually tragic.

I worked for an online pharmacy in Canada for many years, and it’s fraught and full of grey areas for sure. But so so many Americans count on importing generics to afford their medication. You’re talking several times the price difference for the same pills, life changing amounts of money for older people on fixed incomes with health problems. They will simply not be able to access their medication anymore.

2h agoHN ↗

I'd imagine even with duty added they'd still end up being multiple times cheaper

1h agoHN ↗

Yeah, it would...and yet, they covered that as well with another recent change: Packages from foreign and Canadian online pharmacies will be prohibited from entering the U.S. if the same medication is sold domestically or if the foreign pharmacy targets U.S. buyers.

1h agoHN ↗

It is rarely enforced though. And the pharmacies will just replace it and ship it again.

2h agoHN ↗

Are we talking duties imposed on the generics, or generics imports outright banned?

55m agoHN ↗

Just a reminder: Don’t assume that Canadian or other overseas pharmacies are cheaper. Check the actual price with your insurance coverage, or a discount program like GoodRx if you don’t have prescription coverage.

I’ve had multiple conversations in the past several years with people who thought they were saving money with either Canadian pharmacies or, more recently, that Mark Cuban associated cash-only pharmacy. They either assumed it was cheaper without checking or (in one case) were stuck on some price they thought they heard someone else pay for the drug many years ago. A lot of common medications are available very cheaply at local pharmacies and even expensive medications have a sharp price drop off when they go off patent.

2h agoHN ↗

This was the case for at least a year. I used to use AliExpress for affordable small electronics, and when this came into effect, it killed the whole thing (and my hobby, because no way I'm paying the Amazon or eBay tax).

1h agoHN ↗

The hoops you poor Americans have to jump through to get affordable health care is ridiculous in what is presented as a developed nation.

1h agoHN ↗

The hoops are in place to ensure those at the top continue to get their take.

56m agoHN ↗

you said this as if we were developed nation :)

1h agoHN ↗

I know very little about this topic, but maybe this ultimately helps force a real solution to our prescription drug cost problem?

1h agoHN ↗

But how long would the real solution take if it ever comes and what would the collateral damage be while we wait?

31m agoHN ↗

There are so many problems with American healthcare that should have forced a real solution. But nothing much has happened.

13m agoHN ↗

I suspect the only thing that would make people demand a better solution is if we got rid of employer paid health care. If everyone had to buy from the exchange, people would freak out.

1h agoHN ↗

Canadian pharmacies are duct tape for Americas broken health care system. If we rip the tape off first without a fix we're gonna be in trouble.

1h agoHN ↗

Now is a good time to mention:

costplusdrugs.com

I have no affiliation. If anyone wants a domestic alternative to low cost pharmaceuticals this is a good one. Also sometimes GoodRx is worth checking out. Don’t hesitate to ask a pharmacist for a discount if you’re not using insurance. Sometimes that is the best price.