Xinjiang Forced Labor Bill Passes House
A bill that would change the presumption of guilt for goods coming from China's Xinjiang region passed the House of Representatives on a 406-3 vote Sept. 22. Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., an original co-sponsor of the bill, spoke on the floor of the House before the vote. He said “creating a rebuttable assumption” of forced labor in all Xinjiang products is the most important part of the bill.
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House Ways and Means Trade Subcommittee Chairman Earl Blumenauer, D-Ore., said the 1930 law that prohibits the importation of goods made with forced labor has a history of spotty implementation. “We don't pretend that it's going to be easy to stop this. Global supply chains are now complex and interrelated,” he said in a floor speech. “It is going to require the concerted efforts of us all. But we should not allow complex supply chain to justify the chains of oppression on the Uighur populations now.”
The American Apparel and Footwear Association has said that identifying cotton grown in Xinjiang is not feasible (see 2009210036), but that barring goods made in Xinjiang factories could be enforceable, even if AAFA prefers the current CBP policy, whereby investigators must find evidence that a producer is using forced labor.
It is not clear whether the Senate would take up its version of the bill before the end of the year. House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal, D-Mass., put out a statement urging the Senate to act. “The Chinese government’s widespread use of forced labor of Uyghur and other Muslim populations in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China has tainted an overwhelming amount of goods entering the global market,” he said. “This bill makes it clear that the actions of the Chinese government are unacceptable, and those goods are not welcome in the United States.”