[Congressional Bills 119th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[S. 5339 Introduced in Senate (IS)]
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119th CONGRESS
2d Session
S. 5339
To limit the duties that may be imposed with respect to school supplies
and educational materials, and for other purposes.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES
August 6, 2026
Ms. Alsobrooks (for herself, Mr. Van Hollen, Mr. Coons, Mr. Kim, Ms.
Blunt Rochester, Ms. Rosen, and Mr. Hickenlooper) introduced the
following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on
Finance
_______________________________________________________________________
A BILL
To limit the duties that may be imposed with respect to school supplies
and educational materials, and for other purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the
United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ``Back-to-School Supplies
Affordability Act''.
SEC. 2. SENSE OF CONGRESS.
It is the sense of Congress that arbitrary and chaotic tariffs
increase the cost of school supplies for students, families, teachers,
schools, and local governments.
SEC. 3. LIMITATION ON IMPOSITION OF DUTIES ON SCHOOL SUPPLIES AND
EDUCATIONAL MATERIAL.
(a) In General.--Beginning on the date of the enactment of this
Act, no duty described in subsection (b) applies with respect to any
item described in subsection (c).
(b) Duty Described.--A duty is described in this subsection if the
duty imposed on an article exceeds the duty in effect for the article
on January 19, 2025, except if the duty was--
(1) imposed pursuant to title VII of the Tariff Act of 1930
(19 U.S.C. 1671 et seq.); or
(2) proclaimed pursuant to section 201 of the Trade Act of
1974 (19 U.S.C. 2251).
(c) Items Described.--An item is described in this subsection if--
(1) the item is an item used in an elementary or secondary
school classroom, as designated through regulations issued by
the Secretary of Commerce, in coordination with the Secretary
of Education, unless there is enacted into law a joint
resolution of disapproval under subsection (e) with respect to
the item; or
(2) the item is classified under any of the following
headings, subheadings, and statistical reporting numbers of the
Harmonized Tariff Schedule of the United States:
(A) 3926.10 (Office or school supplies).
(B) 4202.92 (Backpack and lunchboxes).
(C) 4820.10.20 (Diaries, notebooks and address
books, bound, memorandum pads, letter pads, and similar
articles).
(D) 4903 (Children's picture, drawing, or coloring
books).
(E) 4910 (Calendars).
(F) 8471.60.20 (Keyboards).
(G) 9603.29.8010 (Hairbrushes).
(H) 9606 (Pencils, crayons, pencil leads, pastels,
drawing charcoals, writing or drawing chalks and
tailors' chalks).
(I) 9608 (Ball point pens, felt tipped and other
porous tipped pens and markers, fountain pens, pencil-
holders and similar holders, parts of the foregoing
articles).
(d) Report to Congress.--Not later than 180 days after the date of
the enactment of this Act, and every 180 days thereafter, the Secretary
of Commerce shall submit to the Committee on Finance of the Senate and
the Committee on Ways and Means of the House of Representatives a
report that includes--
(1) a list of the items exempt from the application of
duties pursuant to this Act; and
(2) a list of the items designated, during the period
covered by the report, by the Secretary pursuant to subsection
(c)(1).
(e) Joint Resolution of Disapproval.--
(1) Joint resolution of disapproval defined.--In this
section, the term ``joint resolution of disapproval'' means a
joint resolution the sole matter after the resolving clause of
which is as follows: ``That Congress disapproves the
designation of _____ as a school supply eligible for exemption
from duties under section 3 of the Back-to-School Supplies
Affordability Act, notice of which was submitted to Congress on
______.'', with the first blank space being filled with the
name of the item and the second blank space being filled with
the date the report that contained the designation of the item
was submitted to Congress.
(2) Expedited procedures.--The provisions of subsections
(b) through (f) of section 152 of the Trade Act of 1974 (19
U.S.C. 2192) apply to a joint resolution of disapproval to the
same extent that such subsections apply to joint resolutions
under such section 152.
(3) Rules of the senate and the house of representatives.--
This subsection is enacted by Congress--
(A) as an exercise of the rulemaking power of the
Senate and the House of Representatives, respectively,
and as such is deemed a part of the rules of each
House, respectively, but applicable only with respect
to the procedure to be followed in that House in the
case of a joint resolution of disapproval, and
supersedes other rules only to the extent that it is
inconsistent with such rules; and
(B) with full recognition of the constitutional
right of either House to change the rules (so far as
relating to the procedure of that House) at any time,
in the same manner, and to the same extent as in the
case of any other rule of that House.
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