China

Morning Journal — …[Candace Thaxton] has written to Sen. Sherrod Brown, who wrote a letter to the Food and Drug Administration urging them to pursue efforts to find the contaminant in the pet food, which the FDA still has not identified.

“The FDA can’t prove what’s making these dogs sick,” she said, and as a result, the company that produces Waggin’ Train treats is not promising financial compensation to any victims. So far, medical expenses have cost the Thaxtons about $4,000.

Washington Post — As Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping visits Washington Tuesday, members of Congress and others are ramping up their calls for China to address a range of issues including the valuation of its currency, its human rights record and Iran’s nuclear program.

The China currency issue is one that remains a hot topic on Capitol Hill, particularly as the United States continues its sluggish economic recovery. The Senate passed with overwhelming bipartisan support late last year a measure that would have given the Treasury Department greater latitude in pressuring China to allow the value of its currency, the yuan, to rise.

New York Times — On Tuesday, a coalition of big American labor unions, Democratic politicians and trade advocacy groups plans to start campaigning for the Obama administration to file a series of trade cases against China in the auto industry. They accuse Beijing of unfairly subsidizing Chinese auto parts makers and illegally restricting the exports of crucial raw materials that foreign parts makers need to stay competitive.

The group says a 900 percent increase in auto parts imports from China over the last decade, to nearly $12 billion a year, is to blame for job losses in Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania — three swing states that the administration cannot easily ignore in a presidential election year.