Florida’s two senators have introduced a bill that would force companies to disclose if they are profiting from forced labor in China or doing business with Chinese firms affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party and its army.
The Transaction and Sourcing Knowledge (TASK) Act would require the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to order publicly traded companies to report links to products made from forced labor from the Xinjian Uyghur Autonomous Region, as well as business with Chinese companies that pose a risk to national security.
Sens. Marco Rubio and Rick Scott, both Republicans, introduced the bill, which is co-sponsored by Sens. Mike Braun (R-IN), Bill Hagerty (R-TN), Ted Cruz (R-TX), and Joni Ernst (R-IA).
“Far too many American corporations profit from slave labor in China,” Rubio said in a release from his office. “It is already illegal for these companies to import goods made with slave labor into the United States, and in two months, they will be prohibited from importing any goods from Xinjiang unless they can prove there is no slave labor. These companies must be transparent with their shareholders by disclosing the risks associated with products linked to Xinjiang and with companies complicit in genocide and the use of slave labor.”
A report from the U.S. Department of Labor Bureau of International Labor Affairs details the human rights abuses underway in Chinese labor campus. Titled “Against Their Will: The Situation in Xinjiang,” it provides details of people forced to work in these camps.
“People’s Republic of China has arbitrarily detained more than one million Uyghurs and other mostly Muslim minorities in China’s far western Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. (1) It is estimated that 100,000 Uyghurs and other ethnic minority ex-detainees in China may be working in conditions of forced labor following detention in re-education camps. (2) Many more rural poor workers also may experience coercion without detention. (3; 4) China has been included on the List of Goods Produced by Child Labor of Forced Labor (TVPRA List) since 2009. In 2020, the Bureau of International Labor Affairs (ILAB) added five goods produced by forced labor by Muslim minorities in China to the 2020 edition of the TVPRA List. These goods include gloves, hair products, textiles, thread/yarn, and tomato products. In 2021, ILAB added an additional good, Polysilicon, produced by forced labor by Muslim minorities in China,” the report states.
In March 2021, the Federal Communications Commission cited the Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Act of 2019, which was designed to protect American communications networks, in listing five Chinese firms as threats to national security.
They included Huawei Technologies Co, ZTE Corp, Hytera Communications Corp, Hangzhou Hikvision Digital Technology Co. and Zhejiang Dahua Technology Co.
The FCC added three more firms later that same month: AO Kaspersky Lab, China Telecom (Americas) Corp and China Mobile International USA Inc.
The U.S.-China Business Council (USCBC), a private, nonpartisan, nonprofit organization comprised of American companies that do business with China, is studying the issue, according to Vice President for Communications and Publications Douglas K. Barry.
At first, he said he was not ready to respond.
“We have no comment at this time as we are still discuss internally,” Barry told Globe Banner.
But on Friday, he added to that.
“Our member companies follow U.S. law and are diligent about monitoring their supply chains in China,” Barry said.
The U.S.-China Business Council, which represents more than 260 American firms, provides information, advisory, and advocacy services to its members. Its mission is to expand the commercial relationship between the two countries.
The USCBC has offices in Washington, D.C.; Beijing and Shanghai.
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