Industry News

President Trump Issues "Buy American, Hire American" Executive Order

April 20, 2017


President Trump issued an executive order on April 18, 2017 declaring that the federal agencies, to the greatest extent allowed by law, shall make use of American-made products. This order, among other things, seeks explicitly to provide support for domestic manufacturing and defense sectors, defining American-made steel as those products whose entire manufacturing process, from the “initial melting stage through the application of coatings”, took place in the United States.

As part of this new agenda, all federal agency heads will conduct internal investigations into their current domestic procurement and hiring preference policies within 150 of the executive order. Concurrently, the Commerce Department, the United States Trade Representative, and several other agencies are directed, within 60 days of the executive order’s issuance, to provide guidance regarding their internal assessments of their hiring and procurement policies. Within 150 days, the USTR, Commerce Department, and the Secretary of State shall issue a report analyzing the impacts which standing free trade agreements and WTO obligations might have upon the order’s enforcement.

Commerce, USTR, and the Department of State are also tasked with drafting a report compiling the results of the agencies’ comprehensive internal investigations. Furthermore, this report, due 220 days from the order’s issuance, will recommend ways to “strengthen the implementation of current Buy American Laws, including domestic procurement preference policies and programs.”

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