A senator and a House member who sponsored the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act in their respective chambers have asked the union that represents National Basketball Association players to consider the fact that Chinese sportswear companies Anta, Li-Ning and Peak use cotton grown in the Xinjang region. The U.S. blocks the importation of all cotton grown in Xinjiang because of the probability that it was planted or harvested with forced labor of Uyghur Muslims. The National Basketball Players Association didn't immediately comment.
Uyghur Human Rights Project Board Chair Nury Turkel told the House Foreign Affairs Committee that his nonprofit wants swift passage of the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, which would create a rebuttable presumption that goods from China's Xinjiang province were made with forced labor. "The 11 current Withhold-release orders (WROs) are a wholly inadequate response to the gravity of the crimes, the harm to American workers whose wages are undercut by forced-labor competition, and the unwitting complicity of American consumers who buy face masks, hair weaves, cotton apparel, and solar panels produced by the forced labor of Muslim Uyghurs," he said in his prepared testimony.
As the U.S. Fashion Industry Association's representatives in Washington try to find out timing for a renewal of the Generalized System of Preferences benefits program, Senate Finance Committee staff members are telling them “there’s a lack of urgency with respect to this” among senators. David Spooner, Washington counsel for USFIA, told an online audience March 30 that Congress seems to think that since importers will get refunds for goods that should have qualified for GSP during this period once it's renewed, it's no big deal. “But we know what a pain in the rear the retroactive renewals are,” he said.
The Senate and House versions of the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act have diverged fairly substantially and the law seems likely to ultimately be closer to the Senate approach, said Ray Bucheger, a lobbyist at FBB Federal Relations. The House bill is more punitive, including a requirement for CBP to name and shame importers whose goods are detained. The Senate bill requires public comment and a public hearing open to importers before establishing a strategy to prevent the importation of goods made with forced labor. Part of that process is expected to produce guidance to importers, and there will still be a rebuttable presumption that goods from China's Xinjiang region were made with forced labor, but if importers implemented the guidance, that would change the burden of proof, according to Bucheger.
The chairman and the ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee said they want to work together on improving enforcement of America's ban on the importation of goods made with forced labor, with Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, saying, “I'm glad this is an issue we both care deeply about.” They spoke at the beginning of a two-hour hearing on fighting forced labor March 18. Crapo said that Congress should pass the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, which would create a rebuttable assumption that goods made in Xinjiang were made with forced labor. Committee Chairman Ron Wyden, D-Ore., said CBP needs more resources to enforce the ban. Crapo also said CBP regulation must provide thoughtful guidance “so Americans know how to avoid importing these goods.”
Therese Randazzo, director of the forced labor division in the trade remedy and law enforcement directorate at CBP, said that although there have been far more withhold release orders than findings since legislation eliminated a forced labor loophole in 2015, the trade community should expect to see more findings in the future. Randazzo, who was speaking on a panel on forced labor at the annual Georgetown Law International Trade Update on March 11, declined to comment on whether CBP has opened an investigation into forced labor in polysilicon from China (see 2101080044). That's an input for solar panels, and about two-thirds of the world's solar panels are made in China.
The U.S Commission on International Religious Freedom, an advisory committee to Congress, heard from four witnesses that passing the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act is the most important thing the U.S. could do to convince companies that sell in the U.S. to exit China's Xinjiang region. One witness, from the Heritage Foundation, said a better first step would be a two-year region-wide withhold release order, which would give CBP time to gather more convincing evidence about the scope of forced labor in the western Chinese province.
Many expect trade policy under the Biden administration to be more worker-focused than consumer-focused, but many specifics remain undecided. “The jury is still out on what that pro-worker trade policy will look like in practice,” said Joshua Boswell, a lawyer at Crowell & Moring. Boswell spoke to a webinar audience Feb. 17 on the 2021 trade outlook and said such predictions don't tell you much about tariffs, free trade negotiations or trade remedies in and of themselves.
Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, a co-sponsor of the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, told International Trade Today that he doesn't expect the Senate to vote on the bill as part of the year-end legislative package.
The head of the House Ways and Means Committee, along with the chairman and a senior member of the Trade Subcommittee, said Dec. 3 that they “have deep concerns about CBP’s ability” to effectively enforce a withhold release order on cotton produced by the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps (see 2012030021). As evidence, they cited a recent Government Accountability Office report on CBP enforcement of imports of goods made with forced labor that was not publicly released.