U.S. suspends Indo-Pacific talks on key aspects of digital trade -lawmakers

The Biden administration has suspended talks on some key digital trade aspects of its Indo-Pacific Economic Framework initiative, Democratic lawmakers said on Tuesday as negotiators from 14 countries race to finish some agreements ahead of a major Pacific Rim summit next week.
The halt comes after the U.S. Trade Representative’s office last month reversed longstanding U.S. digital trade demands at the World Trade Organization — no longer insisting on rules that protect free cross-border data flows and prohibit national requirements for data localization and reviews of software source code.
The U.S. Trade Representative’s office said it withdrew its position to give Congress room to enact stronger technology regulations. That pleased liberal Democrats who want to rein in big U.S tech firms, but angered a broad array of business groups that say it undermines decades of U.S. policy that was enshrined in the 2020 U.S.-Mexico-Canada agreement on trade.
In a letter to Biden, Senator Elizabeth Warren, four other senators and seven members of the House of Representatives said they wanted to ensure that IPEF’s digital trade provisions are consistent with the administration’s new view.