NEW YORK STATE – U.S. Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer today urged the U.S. Department of Commerce to reconsider its recent decision to impose duties on the raw material – uncoated groundwood paper from Canada – used by New York’s already at-risk Upstate and local newspaper companies.

Schumer said Canadian groundwood paper is used by small to large newspapers across New York State, and if the federal government pursues large duties, New York’s large and small newspapers, which already operate on tight margins, would suffer, causing workers to lose jobs and diminishing the flow of top-notch journalism to people across Upstate New York.

Declining newspaper demand could, in turn, harm the paper industry, which these duties aim to protect. That is why the American Forestry Paper Association, which represents 80 percent of U.S. paper manufacturers, opposes the case.

Schumer called on the Commerce Department to reconsider the impact of these duties on America’s paper industry and by extension, newspaper industry, and reconsider their decision that would stave off harmful impacts to an already at-risk, vital American industry.