49 U.S.C. § 32304 — Passenger motor vehicle country of origin labeling

(a) Definitions. This section defines the words used in the label rules. An "allied supplier" is a parts supplier fully owned by the vehicle's manufacturer, or, in a joint venture, fully owned by one of the joint venture partners. A "carline" is a name for a group of passenger vehicles that share basic construction, like the body and chassis. It doesn't matter how fancy the trim is, and (except for light trucks) it doesn't depend on things like the roofline or number of doors. Light trucks always count as a different carline than passenger cars. "Country of origin" for an engine or transmission is the country where the biggest share of its dollar value was added. The U.S. and Canada count as separate countries for this test. The estimate compares the purchase price of materials at the plant, plus the assembly and labor costs of putting the engine or transmission together. A "dealer" is a person in the U.S. (including D.C. or a U.S. territory) who sells new passenger vehicles to buyers. The "final assembly place" is the plant where a new vehicle is finished and made ready to send to a dealer or importer, with everything needed to run the vehicle already included, whether or not it's bolted on yet. It does not include separate plants that make engines or transmissions, or that stamp, machine, or mold the vehicle's parts. "Foreign content" means vehicle equipment that isn't of U.S./Canadian origin. A "manufacturer" is anyone who builds or assembles new passenger vehicles, imports them for resale, or acts under the control of such a builder, assembler, or importer to distribute the vehicles. A "new passenger motor vehicle" is one whose title has never passed from a manufacturer, distributor, or dealer to a final buyer. Equipment is "of United States/Canadian origin" in two ways. If it comes from an outside supplier, the whole purchase price counts if at least 70 percent of its value was added in the U.S. or Canada; if less than 70 percent was added there, only that percentage (rounded to the nearest 5 percent) of the price counts. If it comes from an allied supplier, the manufacturer subtracts the price of all foreign-content material bought from outside suppliers, and what's left counts as U.S./Canadian content, using the same 70-percent test to sort out what's foreign. An "outside supplier" is a supplier that sells parts to a manufacturer's allied supplier, or any other supplier (not an allied supplier) that ships straight to the manufacturer's final assembly place. A "passenger motor vehicle" has the meaning given in section 32101(10), but it also includes any multi-purpose vehicle or light truck rated at 8,500 pounds or less. "Passenger motor vehicle equipment" means a system, subassembly, or part that arrives at the final assembly plant to be installed on the vehicle before its first shipment to a dealer. It does not include small hardware like nuts, bolts, clips, screws, pins, and braces, or other similar items the Secretary of Transportation may list by regulation after talking with manufacturers and labor. The "percentage (by value)" of U.S./Canadian content for a carline is found by taking 100 percent and subtracting the percentage (by value) of non-U.S./Canadian equipment that will go on vehicles in that carline. Value is measured by purchase price, and for outside and allied suppliers, that means the price paid for the equipment at the final assembly place. "State" means each U.S. state, D.C., Puerto Rico, the Northern Mariana Islands, Guam, American Samoa, and the Virgin Islands. "Value added in the United States and Canada" is a percentage found by three steps: take the total purchase price of the equipment, subtract the purchase price of any foreign-content part, then divide that result by the total purchase price. This calculation leaves out costs and profits made at the final assembly plant and beyond, like advertising, assembly, labor, interest, and profit. Engines are grouped with other engines of the same size made at the same plant, and transmissions are grouped with other transmissions of the same type made at the same plant. (b) Manufacturer requirement. For every new passenger vehicle built after September 30, 1994, and sold in the U.S., the manufacturer must set the numbers each model year and attach at least one label in a visible spot on the vehicle. The label must show: (A) the percentage (by value) of U.S./Canadian-origin equipment on vehicles in that carline, labeled "U.S./Canadian content"; (B) the city, state (if it applies), and country where the vehicle was finally assembled; (C) if 15 percent or more (by value) of a carline's equipment came from any single country other than the U.S. or Canada, the names of at least the two countries that supplied the most of that equipment and each one's percentage; and (D) the country of origin of that vehicle's engine and transmission. At the start of each model year, the manufacturer sets these percentages for each carline, and they apply for the whole model year; the manufacturer may round to the nearest 5 percent. A manufacturer that follows the assembly-location rule in (b)(1)(B) also satisfies the separate disclosure duty in section 3(b) of the Automobile Information Disclosure Act. (c) Vehicle content percentage by assembly plant. A manufacturer may add, on the same label, a separate line showing a vehicle's domestic content broken down by which assembly plant built it. That line must come right after the U.S./Canadian content percentage required by (b)(1)(A). (d) Value added determination. If a manufacturer or allied supplier asks an outside supplier for U.S./Canadian content information in time, and makes a good-faith effort but never gets an answer, it may estimate the value added itself, following these rules: it must ask the same 70-percent question the supplier would have answered; it must weigh the same value-added factors and locations the supplier would have considered; it may only conclude that 70 percent or more was added in the U.S./Canada if it has a good-faith basis for that conclusion; a manufacturer and its allied suppliers combined may make these estimates for no more than 10 percent (by value) of a carline's total parts bought from outside suppliers; an estimate made this way counts exactly as if the outside supplier had made it; and none of this excuses the outside supplier from its duty to provide the information when asked. (e) Small parts. For nuts, bolts, clips, screws, pins, braces, gasoline, oil, blackout material, phosphate rinse, windshield washer fluid, fasteners, tire assembly fluid, rivets, adhesives, and grommets, the country of origin is wherever those parts were added during final vehicle assembly. (f) Dealer requirement. Every dealer selling a new passenger vehicle built after September 30, 1994, must keep the required label attached to the vehicle. (g) Form and content of label. The Secretary of Transportation writes the rules for what the label looks like, what it says, and how and where it's attached. The Secretary must let a manufacturer satisfy this section by putting the required information on the label already required by the Automobile Information Disclosure Act, the label required by section 32908, or a separate, clearly visible label. A manufacturer may also add a line naming the country where the vehicle's assembly was finished. (h) Regulations. Working with the Secretaries of Commerce and the Treasury, the Secretary of Transportation must write the regulations needed to carry out this section, including a way to check that label information is accurate. The regulations must give buyers the clearest possible picture of a vehicle's foreign content and U.S./Canadian origin, without piling costly, unnecessary burdens on manufacturers. The Secretary must issue these regulations quickly enough to give manufacturers reasonable time to comply. The regulations must also require outside suppliers and allied suppliers to certify whether their equipment is of U.S. origin, U.S./Canadian origin, or foreign content, and to give any other information the Secretary decides manufacturers need, so manufacturers can rely on that certification. (i) Preemption. While a federal label-content rule is in effect, a state or local government cannot make or enforce its own law about the content of vehicles that the federal rule already covers. But a state or local government can still set its own content rules for vehicles it buys for its own use.