Though silent while the government mulled over the USW’s Section 421 complaint about China-made passenger tires, both Bridgestone Americas and Goodyear issued statements regarding the Obama administration’s decision to levy a three-year tariff on the imported tires.

Still deep in negotiations with the USW for a new master contract, Bridgestone Americas remained quite neutral in the controversy. “Bridgestone Americas believes that it’s important that international trade is conducted on a level playing field that fosters healthy competition, leading to innovation, better quality and lower costs for consumers. Reasonable minds can differ on whether or not this situation is one that calls for action at a governmental level. That being said, we continue to remain neutral on this matter and respect the President’s right to take the action announced last week.”

Goodyear, too, stayed in the middle, but hinted at what impacted tiremakers might do: “As a global company with operations in all regions, Goodyear is a proponent of free and fair trade across the globe. We have limited exposure to the kinds of products that are currently coming into North America from China since Goodyear primarily sells its tires in the regions and markets where they are manufactured. Less than 2% of the tires we sell in North America come from China,” the statement read

“There are too many variables to truly understand or estimate the impact at this point. We acknowledge that this ruling will likely impact other regions of the world because of two factors: 1) Tiremakers can shift their current Chinese-based production to other countries to bypass any potential tariffs to serve the U.S., and 2) The excess capacity from China that would become available because of tariffs is likely to flow to other regions.”