US House passes final version of China bill that bans all Xinjiang imports over forced labour

Name: US announces diplomatic boycott of Beijing Winter Olympics, expects other countries to follow
Uploaded: 2021-12-14T18:48:12.000Z
Duration: 2 min 29 s
Description: US announces diplomatic boycott of Beijing Winter Olympics, expects other countries to follow

Senate and House members compromise on how quickly the import ban must be implemented after the legislation becomes law: 180 days

The bill creates a ‘rebuttable presumption’ that all goods sourced wholly or in part from the western Chinese region of Xinjiang are tainted with forced labour

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Customs and Border Protection officers at the Port of New York/Newark inspect a shipment of imports from China, some of which are suspected to have been made with forced labour. Photo: Handout

Owen Churchill

Published: 2:48am, 15 Dec 2021Updated: 10:45am, 15 Dec 2021

US forced labour legislation that would ban imports from China’s Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region inched closer to becoming law on Tuesday, when the House of Representatives passed a final iteration of the text that reconciled key differences between House and Senate versions.

The Uygur Forced Labour Prevention Act’s main sponsor in the House, Representative Jim McGovern, a Democrat from Massachusetts, announced earlier in the day that he had reached an agreement on the bill’s final text with Senator Marco Rubio, the Florida Republican who has led the legislation in the Senate.

The Senate must vote on the reconciled version before it is sent to President Joe Biden to sign the bill into law.

The new version includes a compromise on how quickly the import ban must be implemented following the legislation’s enactment; the reconciled version provides a grace period of 180 days, significantly shorter than the Senate version’s 300 days and slightly longer than the House bill’s 120 days.

In a voice vote late on Tuesday evening, House Representatives agreed unanimously to the new text, sending the bill to the upper chamber where Senators are expected to vote on the measure as soon as Wednesday.

02:29

US announces diplomatic boycott of Beijing Winter Olympics, expects other countries to follow

“Congress, on a bipartisan and bicameral basis, will continue to condemn and confront the [Chinese Communist Party’s] human rights abuses in Xinjiang and in the region and hold it accountable,” said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat from California.

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