Mercedes USA was big into this. Until the mid 1980s it was pretty easy to bring a car in, grey-market. But people were buying German Mercedes for much less money, adding appropriate catalytic converters etc to meet US standards and "cheating" MBUSA, the importer, from their cut. MBUSA somehow added status to the brand that lead to US yuppies paying more than others around the world-- a coup, to be sure, and one they defend vigorously.
So they lobbied and made it much tougher to privately import during the mid 80s. This isn't government (newly) run amok.