Conferees should spike IP czar language in customs bill
With customs bills having passed both chambers of Congress, it’s now up to conferees to decide if the final legislation will include language from the Senate bill to create a new intellectual property enforcement czar.
As my colleague Mike Godwin previously wrote, the Senate version of the bill – S. 1269, the Trade Facilitation and Trade Enforcement Act – features language advanced by Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, to create a new chief of intellectual-property enforcement within the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative. Section 611 of the bill would amend the Trade Act of 1974 to create the new IP czar, who:
(7) shall be to conduct trade negotiations and to enforce trade agreements relating to United States intellectual property and to take appropriate actions to address acts, policies, and practices of foreign governments that have a significant adverse impact on the value of United States innovation. The Chief Innovation and Intellectual Property Negotiator shall be a vigorous advocate on behalf of United States innovation and intellectual property interests. The Chief Innovation and Intellectual Property Negotiator shall perform such other functions as the United States Trade Representative may direct.
The title “Chief Innovation and Intellectual Property Negotiator” is itself a fundamentally conflicted idea. Promoting maximalist intellectual-property enforcement often will actually hinder innovation in a whole host of ways. In addition to this new position being a generally bad idea, the White House already has an intellectual property enforcement coordinator, who commonly is called the “IP czar.”
What’s more, the Congressional Budget Office estimates in its report on the Senate bill that creating the new position will cost taxpayers at least $10 million over the next four years. Since the USTR already looks out for U.S. intellectual property interests in negotiating trade deals, and the U.S. Commerce Department’s International Trade Administration ensures that our trading partners uphold the terms of those deals, it’s hard to see why this would be a good way to spend taxpayer money. Unless you’re Sen. Hatch, and want to create another White House position that, once confirmed, will be basically unaccountable to you.
Thankfully, this provision was left out of the House version of the bill, H.R. 644. As the two chambers’ bills move to conference this week, conferees should spike the IP czar language. Conservatives, after all, shouldn’t be in the business of needlessly expanding government bureaucracy.
