Special 301 Report Should Put America First

Conservatives for Property Rights has sent Congress a clear message: the 2025 Special 301 Report must be restored to its rightful purpose — identifying and confronting foreign threats to American intellectual property.

Under the weak leadership of the Biden administration and a complacent Congress, this once-powerful trade tool has been systematically watered down. This gives foreign IP thieves a free pass to steal from American businesses without consequence.

The Special 301 Report was designed to call out and hold accountable nations that undermine American innovation. Yet, for the past four years, Congress has stood idly by as the Biden administration's globalist, America-last approach weakened its impact.

Instead of taking decisive action to protect American jobs, lawmakers have allowed USTR to soften its language — failing to expose the worst offenders and emboldening those who wish to exploit our IP laws.

CPR's letter to Congress urges lawmakers to ensure the 2025 report is a "return to the clear, unequivocal assertions of earlier editions" — reinforcing America's commitment to strong IP protections, in line with President Trump's new "America First Trade Policy."

Congress must act. CPR calls on lawmakers to hold USTR accountable and demand the reinstatement of tough scrutiny on compulsory licensing and other IP abuses in the 2025 Special 301 Report. America's leadership in innovation depends on it.

Please read the full letter we sent to the Senate and House below:

---

The Honorable John Cornyn and The Honorable Raphael Warnock

Chairman and Ranking Member

Senate Finance International Trade, Customs and Global Competitiveness Subcommittee

219 Dirksen Senate Office Building

Washington, D.C. 20510

The Honorable Adrian Smith and The Honorable Linda Sánchez

Chairman and Ranking Member

House Ways and Means Subcommittee on Trade

1139 Longworth House Office Building

Washington, D.C. 20515

Dear Chairmen Cornyn and Smith and Ranking Members Warnock and Sanchez:

For nearly 40 years, Congress has tasked the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative with compiling an annual Special 301 report to identify foreign countries that routinely violate American firms' intellectual property.

But under the Biden administration, the USTR deliberately weakened the language of the Special 301 report. The past four annual reports have watered down a number of key U.S. positions on IP rights. This effectively invites other nations to infringe on Americans' patented, copyrighted, and trademarked technologies and products.

With the arrival of a new administration, Congress has a chance to press for wholesale reform -- restoration, rather -- that ensures the Special 301 report once again fulfills its mandate. Conservatives for Property Rights, as an organization dedicated to defending private property as both a fundamental right and a profound social good, respectfully urges you to make sure the 2025 report adheres to its statutory purpose.

Crucially, bringing the Special 301 Report back in line with congressional intent would complement President Trump's newly issued "America First Trade Policy." The Trump administration has made clear that it intends to take a strong stand against unfair trade practices that harm American industries and workers. The Policy explicitly directs the USTR to "undertake a review of, and identify, any unfair trade practices by other countries and recommend appropriate actions to remedy such practices." Furthermore, it calls for the USTR to "review existing United States trade agreements and sectoral trade agreements and recommend any revisions that may be necessary or appropriate."

The USTR does not need to wait for new processes to be established to begin this important work. The Special 301 Report already provides a structured mechanism for identifying unfair IP-related trade practices around the world and can help lay the groundwork for a fairer, more balanced trade policy that protects America's most innovative industries.

Specifically, the 2025 report should return to the clear, unequivocal assertions of earlier editions, such as the 2020 report's straightforward declaration that "IP infringement undermines U.S. competitive advantages in innovation and creativity, to the detriment of American businesses and workers." This is the statement of principle upon which the entire issue hinges, and the institution of a mealy-mouthed alternative under the Biden administration has created the impression that America has gone soft on IP rights.

The stakes couldn't be higher. IP-reliant industries drive the U.S. economy. A report from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office found that, in 2019 just before the pandemic, 127 IP-intensive industries contributed $7.8 trillion in economic output and accounted for 33% of jobs nationwide. The 2024 Special 301 Report lacks the language from previous reports about this economic impact.

In addition to this language, the report must restore long-standing positions concerning compulsory licensing of U.S. patents -- the practice of foreign governments authorizing their domestic industries to make use of American patents without the permission of the patent-holders. Long understood as a last-resort emergency measure, compulsory licensing is now deployed willy-nilly to infringe on the rights of firms that hold valuable intellectual property they developed at great risk and cost.

Recent Special 301 reports have essentially removed all mention of compulsory licensing. Just last year, Colombia issued an unprecedented compulsory license for dolutegravir, a vital drug used in the treatment of HIV. The Colombian government took this extraordinary step despite repeated efforts by the IP owner to reach an agreement to distribute dolutegravir in the country without infringement of its patents. Indeed, Colombian government officials have declared that more compulsory licenses are coming, and have stated that Colombia will "lead or support the position of abolishing patents." This is the kind of abuse that the USTR used to call out in Special 301 reports, but ceased to do so under the Biden administration.

Biden officials planted the seeds of this new status quo during the COVID-19 pandemic. In May 2021, then-USTR Katherine Tai announced that "[t]he [Biden] Administration believes strongly in intellectual property protections, but in service of ending this pandemic, supports the waiver of those protections for COVID-19 vaccines." Tai claimed the "extraordinary circumstances" of "a global health crisis" as justification for the move.

But in reality, there was no need for such an extreme, precedent-breaking measure. Vaccine patent owners were already inking scores of voluntary licensing deals with manufacturers in the developing world. And both developed and developing countries quickly accumulated a glut of vaccine doses. The United States ended up sitting on 82 million unused vaccine doses, and countries around the world halted production due to a lack of demand. To date, not a single country had notified the WTO that it planned to utilize the waiver to make its own vaccine.

Nevertheless, proponents seized on the USTR's formulation to declare innumerable additional "extraordinary circumstances" supposedly justifying waivers or compulsory licensing. One year after Ambassador Tai's announcement, U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres called for the removal of "intellectual property constraints" in order to enable "a rapid and fair renewable energy transition." His logic is backward. New technologies are the result of strong IP rights and a pro-innovation economy. Technologies like carbon capture and storage, alongside other innovations key to both sustainable and established energy production, benefit greatly from IP protections that incentivize innovation.

The 2025 report must also offer an accurate and unflinching account of the countries where burdensome patenting restrictions make U.S. engagement impractical. The 2020 Special 301 report -- the last before the Biden administration took office -- addressed this issue head-on. In Argentina, for instance, the USTR noted that "unduly broad limitations on patent-eligible subject matter … have interfered with the ability of companies investing in Argentina to protect their IP and may be inconsistent with international norms."

While Argentina remained on the Priority Watch List in the 2024 report, all mention of patentability criteria went missing. This change did not go unnoticed: the Argentine Chamber of Pharmaceutical Laboratories gleefully noted that the report "no longer includes criticism regarding the existence of undue limitations on the patentability of pharmaceutical and biotechnological products in Argentina, nor questions to the patentability guidelines in force since 2012."

The clear message: the United States no longer stands in defense of its citizens' IP rights. This posture effectively signals to international actors that they are free to infringe on American IP with impunity -- and de facto U.S. approval.

Were this lackadaisical attitude to continue at the USTR, the firms that have been responsible for so much American innovation and wealth creation would have a much harder time justifying the expense and risk of developing new technologies. If they lose confidence in the security of IP protection, the result will be the withering of dynamic industries on which so many American jobs depend.

That is why a strong Special 301 report is so important. We urge Congress to use its oversight authority to ensure that the USTR restores consideration of compulsory licensing and other urgent IP matters that the Biden administration eliminated from or downplayed in its Special 301 reports.

The world needs to see a clear restatement in the 2025 report of the fundamental U.S. commitment to IP protection -- alongside detailed descriptions of specific cases of abuses abroad. After four years of weak-willed indifference, it's time for the USTR to send a message of warning to those seeking to undermine the basis of American innovation.

Sincerely,

James Edwards

Executive Director

Conservatives for Property Rights

Red Tape for Red Tape Makers

The robust economy under the first Trump administration was aided in part by an executive order that directed federal departments and agencies to eliminate two existing regulations for every one new one.

Its Trump II successor is executive order 14192, “Unleashing Prosperity Through Deregulation.” This new and improved version requires agencies to get rid of at least 10 existing rules, regulations or guidance for every new rule, regulation or guidance issued. The E.O. says this exercise must translate into marked net savings, with regulatory costs of “significantly less than zero” in the current, 2025 fiscal year.

The latest red tape on the red tape imposed by red-tape factories known as federal bureaucracies has gotten some favorable nods, such as by Susan E. Dudley in Forbes and Clyde Wayne Crews of the Competitive Enterprise Institute.

The new E.O. could take a bite out of the Administrative State. It does some housekeeping, such as empowering the Office of Management and Budget to hold bureaus accountable through use of uniform estimates and measurements of regulatory costs. And any item of red tape must have appeared in the most recent Unified Regulatory Agenda.

The effects of the changes (good-government improvements) this E.O. makes could prove to be quite constraining on the Administrative State’s minions. Consider an attorney’s explanation of the impact to 401kSpecialist:

“‘To put things in some perspective, in 2024 alone the Department of Labor issued or proposed three significant new ERISA-related regulations (a regulation on environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investing, a regulation requiring lifetime income illustrations in participant disclosures, and a proposed regulation on fiduciary advice),’ Ari Sonneberg, Chief Marketing Officer and Partner at The Wagner Law Group, wrote in a Law Alert today. ‘The cost to the Department of Labor for just three new regulations under the Trump Administration will be the elimination of 30 existing regulations.’ ”

Multiply that math by all the regulatory agencies in Washington, then think about the scale of Elon Musk’s DOGE efficiency measures and reduction in the federal workforce. Next, factor in the ramifications of the Loper Bright elimination of judicial deference to bureaucrats’ statutory interpretations.

That means the Administrative State may actually be reined in over the next four years.

Biden’s Legacy: Pretty Shabby

As Joe Biden’s presidency comes to an end, the time has come for taking stock of his performance in that position of public trust. Judged by Biden’s effect on property rights, he has done exceptionally badly.

President Biden was elected on the false notion that he would govern from the middle of the road. Instead, he governed from the far Left.

Rather than bringing in experienced moderate and centrist Democrats capable of working across the aisle, Biden handed the reins to extremist ideologues, acolytes of Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, and Left-wing political zealots. For instance, Lina Khan at the Federal Trade Commission, Tim Wu at the White House and Rohit Chopra at the FTC and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

Rather than seeking consensus by forging bipartisan legislation where a foundation for such constructive efforts lies, Biden force-fed Republicans, independents and moderate Democrats the most extreme, divisive policy prescriptions. A few disreputable examples are:

• Heavy-handed rules and lavish government subsidies to force electric vehicles on the country and outlaw internal-combustion-engine-powered cars, SUVs and trucks.

• Trillions of taxpayer dollars wasted, including in the American Rescue Plan, that supercharged inflation to levels not seen in four decades. This form of hidden taxation has caused American families unnecessary economic stress and financial difficulty.

• Weak patent policies, such as the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s wholesale, deliberate misinterpretation of the Bayh-Dole Act’s march-in provision, which has loomed over technology transfer for a year, while the National Institutes of Health has issued an eleventh-hour version of price controls. Rather than standing up for the TRIPS Agreement’s IP protections, Biden went all in on adopting a patent-stealing exception.

• Imposing overly restrictive export controls that punish American innovator companies more than they bind China.

• Enacting drug price controls in the socialistic, misnamed “Inflation Reduction Act.” These threaten the continued U.S. lead in biopharmaceutical innovation because government-set prices reduce revenues that fund high-risk, high-reward R&D, which is key to American innovation.

• Income redistribution through unlawful student loan forgiveness schemes. Biden has taken from the working class, people who didn’t take on debt to go to school and other financially prudent Americans to bail out the irresponsible.

• Vast expansion of the Administrative State, multiplying the regulatory burden on many parts of the U.S. economy, businesses large and small, and American life.

• Reviving obsolete, subjective antitrust policies and procedures, and imposing sweeping measures that have assaulted objective, empirical antitrust standards. Biden weaponized antitrust against routine mergers and acquisitions that would have benefited consumers and create dynamic competition, wealth and jobs.

• Forcing unionization, PRO Act style, through regulatory actions, even in right-to-work law states.

These examples beg the question: How much damage to private property rights has Biden’s wrong-headed policies caused?

How much innovation has his administration murdered in the crib? How much wealth was never created because the economic activity that otherwise would have occurred never did? How much has Biden-caused heightened risk and uncertainty frozen entrepreneurs, investors and corporations from pursuing the most economically and strategically sensible paths forward that would have yielded the greatest benefit?

The Biden legacy is one of leaving the nation less well off, less prosperous, less free, less thriving, less united. America is left with less secure property rights, less economic freedom, and less security — a sorry place to be just one year before the United States’ 250th anniversary of declaring our independence from a tyrant. In a sense, we may be repeating that exercise at this very time.