The Intercept is reporting on a leaked memo they received that would loosen the provision in the Dodd Frank Act that forced companies to audit their supply chains when it came to collecting mineral resources like diamonds and gold and all of the things you find in your electronics—my laptop, for example.
The passage, tucked into the bill's "Miscellaneous Provisions," will require thousands of U.S. companies to disclose what steps they are taking to ensure that their products, including laptops, cellphones and medical devices, don't contain "conflict minerals" from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The sale of such minerals has fueled a nearly 15-year war that has been marked by a horrific epidemic of sexual violence.
There are pluses and minuses to the rule. On one hand the attempt here is to choke off funding for very violent warlords. On the other hand there are many Africans who work the mines that are hurt economically as a result of the new rules. However, the rule was a clear step forward in the United States’ acknowledgement of the role our economy had in helping to perpetuate human suffering around the globe. But making things better for the people of the Congo is probably very low on this administration’s list.
The memo, distributed inside the administration on Friday afternoon and obtained by The Intercept, directs the Securities and Exchange Commission to temporarily waive the requirements of the Conflict Mineral Rule, a provision of the Dodd Frank Act, for two years — which the rule explicitly allows the president to do for national security purposes. The memorandum also directs the State Department and Treasury Department to find an alternative plan to “address such problems in the DRC and adjoining countries.”
Big business, including in no small part the tech industry, is going to be very happy about these new rules. From Reuters:
But business groups have staunchly opposed the measure, saying it forces companies to furnish politically-charged information that is irrelevant to making investment decisions.
They have also complained it costs too much money for companies to trace the source of the minerals through the supply chain.
Trump’s decision will once again get couched under national security:
Human rights advocates — who had celebrated the conflicts rule as a major step forward — were appalled. “Any executive action suspending the U.S. conflict minerals rule would be a gift to predatory armed groups seeking to profit from Congo’s minerals as well as a gift to companies wanting to do business with the criminal and the corrupt,” said Carly Oboth, the policy adviser at Global Witness, in a statement responding to a Reuters article that first reported the move.
“It is an abuse of power that the Trump administration is claiming that the law should be suspended through a national security exemption intended for emergency purposes. Suspending this provision could actually undermine U.S. national security.”
As the Reuters article above points out, Trump and Bannon have already gotten a little “national security” cheerleading going:
Last week, Acting SEC Chair Michael Piwowar took steps toward doing just that, by announcing he has asked SEC staff to reconsider how companies should comply with it and whether "additional relief" is warranted.
Piwowar did not explicitly ask Trump to utilize his powers under Dodd-Frank to temporality suspend the rule; however, in his statement, he spoke about how he had traveled to Africa to study the rule's impact and raised concerns about its effect on national security.
As Trump dismantles the small steps in trying to make the world a better place, just remember that he isn’t going to replace it with anything better, no matter what people might pray for.