[House Hearing, 118 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]


                 EXPLOITATION AND ENFORCEMENT PART II: 
        IMPROVING ENFORCEMENT IN COUNTERING UYGHUR FORCED LABOR

=======================================================================

                                HEARING

                               BEFORE THE

                            SUBCOMMITTEE ON
                       OVERSIGHT, INVESTIGATIONS,
                           AND ACCOUNTABILITY

                                 OF THE

                     COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY
                        HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                    ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS

                             SECOND SESSION
                               __________

                            JANUARY 11, 2024
                               __________

                           Serial No. 118-48
                               __________

       Printed for the use of the Committee on Homeland Security
                                     

                  [GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]


        Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.govinfo.gov
                               __________

                    U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
                    
57-069 PDF                 WASHINGTON : 2024           
        

                               __________

                     COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY

                 Mark E. Green, MD, Tennessee, Chairman
Michael T. McCaul, Texas             Bennie G. Thompson, Mississippi, 
Clay Higgins, Louisiana                  Ranking Member
Michael Guest, Mississippi           Sheila Jackson Lee, Texas
Dan Bishop, North Carolina           Donald M. Payne, Jr., New Jersey
Carlos A. Gimenez, Florida           Eric Swalwell, California
August Pfluger, Texas                J. Luis Correa, California
Andrew R. Garbarino, New York        Troy A. Carter, Louisiana
Marjorie Taylor Greene, Georgia      Shri Thanedar, Michigan
Tony Gonzales, Texas                 Seth Magaziner, Rhode Island
Nick LaLota, New York                Glenn Ivey, Maryland
Mike Ezell, Mississippi              Daniel S. Goldman, New York
Anthony D'Esposito, New York         Robert Garcia, California
Laurel M. Lee, Florida               Delia C. Ramirez, Illinois
Morgan Luttrell, Texas               Robert Menendez, New Jersey
Dale W. Strong, Alabama              Yvette D. Clarke, New York
Josh Brecheen, Oklahoma              Dina Titus, Nevada
Elijah Crane, Arizona
                      Stephen Siao, Staff Director
                  Hope Goins, Minority Staff Director
                       Sean Corcoran, Chief Clerk
                                 ------                                

     SUBCOMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT, INVESTIGATIONS, AND ACCOUNTABILITY

                  Dan Bishop, North Carolina, Chairman
Marjorie Taylor Greene, Georgia      Glenn Ivey, Maryland, Ranking 
Mike Ezell, Mississippi                  Member
Dale W. Strong, Alabama              Shri Thanedar, Michigan
Elijah Crane, Arizona                Delia C. Ramirez, Illinois
Mark E. Green, MD, Tennessee (ex     Yvette D. Clarke, New York
    officio)                         Bennie G. Thompson, Mississippi 
                                         (ex officio)
                  Sang Yi, Subcommittee Staff Director
           Lisa Canini, Minority Subcommittee Staff Director

                            C O N T E N T S

                              ----------                              
                                                                   Page

                               Statements

The Honorable Dan Bishop, a Representative in Congress From the 
  State of North Carolina, and Chairman, Subcommittee on 
  Oversight, Investigations, and Accountability:
  Oral Statement.................................................     1
  Prepared Statement.............................................     3
The Honorable Glenn Ivey, a Representative in Congress From the 
  State of Maryland, and Ranking Member, Subcommittee on 
  Oversight, Investigations, and Accountability..................     4
The Honorable Bennie G. Thompson, a Representative in Congress 
  From the State of Mississippi, and Ranking Member, Committee on 
  Homeland Security:
  Prepared Statement.............................................     6

                               Witnesses

Ms. Christa Brzozowski, Acting Assistant Secretary, Trade and 
  Economic Security Policy, Office of Strategy, Policy, and 
  Plans, U.S. Department of Treasury:
  Oral Statement.................................................     7
  Prepared Statement.............................................     9
Mr. Eric Choy, Executive Director, Trade Remedy Law Enforcement 
  Directorate, U.S. Customs and Border Protection:
  Oral Statement.................................................    12
  Prepared Statement.............................................    14
Ms. Thea Lee, Deputy Secretary for International Affairs, Bureau 
  of International Labor Affairs, U.S. Department of Labor:
  Oral Statement.................................................    17
  Prepared Statement.............................................    19

                                Appendix

Question From Honorable Mike Ezell for Eric Choy.................    43

 
    EXPLOITATION AND ENFORCEMENT PART II: IMPROVING ENFORCEMENT IN 
                     COUNTERING UYGHUR FORCED LABOR

                              ----------                              


                       Thursday January 11, 2024

             U.S. House of Representatives,
                    Committee on Homeland Security,
                Subcommittee on Oversight, Investigations, 
                                        and Accountability,
                                                    Washington, DC.
    The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m., at 
Room 310, Cannon House Office Building, Hon. Dan Bishop 
[Chairman of the subcommittee] presiding.
    Present: Representatives Bishop, Ezell, Strong, Ivey, and 
Thanedar.
    Chairman Bishop. The Committee on Homeland Security 
Subcommittee on Oversight, Investigations, and Accountability 
will come to order. Without objection, the Chair is authorized 
to declare the committee in recess at any point.
    The purpose of today's hearing is to investigate the 
Federal Government's efforts to prevent goods made with Uyghur 
forced labor in China from entering the United States. I now 
recognized myself for an opening statement.
    Today's hearing of the subcommittee follows up on our 
previous hearing on enforcement of the Uyghur Forced Labor 
Prevention Act in October. During that October hearing, a panel 
of policy experts and industry representatives highlighted on-
going issues and concerns relating to preventing goods made 
with Uyghur forced labor from being imported into the United 
States. While importing goods made with forced labor has been 
against Federal law since 1930, through implementation of the 
UFLPA, Congress recognized that China's state-sponsored system 
of forced labor represents a unique challenge on account of its 
mass scale and the regime's power to obstruct investigations 
into forced labor. This is an economic, strategic, and moral 
issue, and the UFLPA marked a significant step toward 
countering China's predatory and exploitative practices.
    Unfortunately, China's use of forced labor in global supply 
chains continues to pose a significant enforcement challenge 
across a wide range of economic sectors, including textiles, 
minerals, and seafood. For example, the overwhelming majority 
of cotton used in Chinese textile products is grown in Xinjiang 
Province, which the UFLPA specifically singles out as a focal 
point of China's state-sponsored forced labor regime. Any 
cotton grown in the province is presumptively linked to forced 
labor under the UFLPA. Yet CBP's isotopic testing of clothing 
samples still found items shipped to the United States made 
with cotton from Xinjiang, and CBP detained $46 million worth 
of textile and clothing imports for suspected UFLPA violations 
since June 2022. Yet CBP's detention rate is just a sliver of 
the billions of dollars of textile products the United States 
imports annually from China, emphasizing the continuing 
challenge in effectively enforcing the UFLPA.
    Furthermore, those seeking to profit off goods tainted with 
forced labor use a wide range of tactics to obscure forced 
labor in the supply chain, such as shipping products through 
other countries to disguise the country of origin, mixing 
inputs produced with forced labor with clean inputs, and 
misrepresenting the origin of the products in question. 
Technologies such as isotopic testing can help identify inputs 
traced to a geographic area, such as cotton grown in Xinjiang, 
but it is not clear how widely or routinely such forensic 
technologies are being used.
    In our October hearing, several witnesses pointed to the 
rapid increase in de minimis shipments as an avenue for 
prohibited goods to enter the United States, with de minimis 
shipments more than doubling over the last 5 years and more 
than 1 billion de minimis shipments entering the United States 
in fiscal year 2023. As you would expect, an increase in 
shipments increases the chances of contraband getting through. 
The majority of these de minimis shipments originate in China.
    Our witnesses also highlighted the limited scale of the 
UFLPA Entity List. This list contains 30 entities, only 10 of 
which have been added since the initial list was published. 
Notably, many of those entities on the initial list were 
already subject to withhold release orders blocking their 
imports, so they were already on the Government's radar. It 
seems that the Entity List is merely scratching the surface of 
the vast universe of potential entities that could be listed.
    Is the interagency process to consider new additions too 
cumbersome? Are there ways this process might be improved? More 
broadly, given Beijing's resistance to supply chain 
investigations for forced labor and its control of information, 
does the task force have sufficient capabilities to monitor and 
analyze the use of forced labor within China? These are the 
questions we hope our witnesses today can help us answer.
    The purpose of today's hearing is to examine current 
efforts to enforce the UFLPA, as well as the challenges 
encountered since the law went into effect a year and a half 
ago, and, ultimately, to identify ways that enforcement can be 
improved and made more effective. These are all serious matters 
to consider as this committee carries out its oversight 
responsibilities to ensure effective enforcement of the UFLPA.
    I want to thank our witnesses from the Department of 
Homeland Security's Customs and Border Patrol and the 
Department of Labor for joining us today. I look forward to 
hearing their testimony.
    [The statement of Chairman Bishop follows:]
                    Statement of Chairman Dan Bishop
                            January 11, 2024
    Today's hearing of the Subcommittee on Oversight, Investigations, 
and Accountability follows up on our previous hearing on enforcement of 
the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act in October. During that October 
hearing, a panel of policy experts and industry representatives 
highlighted on-going issues and concerns related to preventing goods 
made with Uyghur forced labor from being imported into the United 
States.
    While importing goods made with forced labor has been against 
Federal law since 1930, through implementation of the UFLPA, Congress 
recognized that China's state-sponsored system of forced labor presents 
a unique challenge on account of its mass scale and the regime's power 
to obstruct investigations into forced labor.
    This is an economic, strategic, and moral issue, and the UFLPA 
marked a significant step toward countering China's predatory and 
exploitative practices.
    Unfortunately, China's use of forced labor in global supply chains 
continues to pose a significant enforcement challenge across a wide 
range of economic sectors, including textiles, minerals, and seafood.
    For example, the overwhelming majority of cotton used in Chinese 
textile products is grown in the Xinjiang province, which the UFLPA 
specifically singles out as a focal point of China's state-sponsored 
forced labor regime. Any cotton grown in the province is presumptively 
linked to forced labor under the UFLPA, yet CBP's isotopic testing of 
clothing samples still found items shipped to the United States made 
with cotton from Xinjiang and CBP detained $46 million worth of textile 
and clothing imports for suspected UFLPA violations since June 2022.
    Yet CBP's detention rate is just a sliver of the billions of 
dollars of textile products the U.S. imports annually from China, 
emphasizing the continuing challenge in effectively enforcing the 
UFLPA.
    Furthermore, those seeking to profit off goods tainted with forced 
labor use a wide range of tactics to obscure forced labor in the supply 
chain, such as shipping products through other countries to disguise 
the country of origin, mixing inputs produced with forced labor with 
clean inputs, and misrepresenting the origin of the products in 
question.
    Technology such as isotopic testing can help identify inputs traced 
to a geographic area, such as cotton grown in Xinjiang, but it is not 
clear how widely or routinely such forensic technologies are being 
used.
    In our October hearing, several witnesses pointed to the rapid 
increase in de minimis shipments as an avenue for prohibited goods to 
enter the United States, with de minimis shipments more than doubling 
over the last 5 years and more than one billion de minimis shipments 
entering the United States in fiscal year 2023. As you would expect, an 
increase in shipments increases the chances of contraband getting 
through. The majority of these de minimis shipments originate in China.
    Our witnesses also highlighted the limited scale of the UFLPA 
Entity List. This list contains 30 entities, only 10 of which have been 
added since the initial list was published.
    Notably, many of those entities on the initial list were already 
subject to Withhold Release Orders blocking their imports, so they were 
already on the Government's radar. It seems that the Entity List is 
merely scratching the surface of the vast universe of potential 
entities that could be listed.
    Is the interagency process to consider new additions too 
cumbersome? Are there ways that this process might be improved?
    More broadly, given Beijing's resistance to supply chain 
investigations for forced labor and its control of information, does 
the task force have sufficient capabilities to monitor and analyze the 
use of forced labor within China?
    These are questions we hope our witnesses today can help us answer.
    The purpose of today's hearing is to examine current efforts to 
enforce the UFLPA, as well as the challenges encountered since the law 
went into effect a year-and-a-half ago, and ultimately to identify ways 
that enforcement can be improved and made more effective.
    These are all serious matters to consider as this committee carries 
out its oversight responsibilities to ensure effective enforcement of 
the UFLPA. I want to thank our witnesses from DHS, CBP, and the 
Department of Labor for joining us today, and I look forward to hearing 
their testimony.

    Chairman Bishop. If I can get it out of my throat here, I 
now recognize the Ranking Member, the gentleman from Maryland, 
Mr. Ivey, for his opening statement.
    Mr. Ivey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will pass the water 
down to you.
    But I did want to say to the Chairman again, this is our 
second hearing. We had one before. I want to repeat, though, my 
deep appreciation for the fact that we are having bipartisan 
hearings, that, you know, I am looking at the witnesses, they 
are not Republican or Democratic witnesses on there per se. I 
think it is a fair opportunity to get actual information in a 
nonpartisan way so we can do the things that we need to do to 
address whatever issues there may be or provide whatever 
additional resources there are.
    In fact, the opening statement he gave sounds a lot like 
what I had planned on raising as well. So, I do want to thank 
all of you all for coming today. My throat is getting bad too 
now, so maybe it is that time of year.
    But, you know, in the first hearing, we went through a 
different panel. We had people come in and they talked about 
some of the issues they had from an industry perspective, in 
part, you know, with respect to the textile industry in 
particular. I did want to expand that out, as I did in the 
first hearing, and look at issues beyond the Uyghurs and 
textiles. African minerals, for example, is one that I have 
particular interest in and to the extent forced labor is 
involved there, I have come across articles and other types of 
reporting that discuss the extensive issue that is there and 
the great problem that it has generated there.
    I know there are issues with respect to the supply chain 
and how the United States and some of the companies benefit 
potentially from that kind of forced labor, and I think we need 
to take a look at that as well. So to the extent we can discuss 
that today, and, hopefully, I am not blindsiding you because I 
don't know that that was the initial request on what to cover 
today, but that is certainly an interest of mine.
    Then another twist, I guess, too, I know we talked a lot 
about the Government's role as a regulator, as an enforcer, and 
I will come back to that in a moment. But I also want to talk 
today a little bit about or hear from you a little bit about 
the Government as a consumer. To the extent we are talking 
about textiles, God only knows what the Department of Defense 
spends on uniforms and clothing and materials. Are there 
additional steps that we could take with respect to that angle, 
Government as customer, that could provide extra leverage that 
we are not taking advantage of?
    Same with other issues, like the minerals. I know that a 
lot of those are used in, you know, high-tech devices and 
hardware. Are there additional things that the Federal 
Government can do?
    I want to make sure that we are not just talking the talk, 
we are walking the walk as well on our part. So to extent there 
is guidance that you can give us or additional things that the 
Government can do, probably without legislation, but, you know, 
if that is needed, that is fine, but just from a procurement 
standpoint, are there additional things that we can do to help 
put extra leverage on this issue?
    Expanding the Entity List, I know that the Chairman touched 
on that a moment ago. I remember from some of the research I 
have done and some of the testimony at the first hearing that 
it is a lot smaller than I had expected when I started doing 
the research on this. The question is, why is that? The 
feedback we got was there is potentially risk of, you know, 
going too fast and getting the Government in trouble from a due 
process standpoint, in other words, putting businesses on the 
list that we couldn't prove belong there, even with the 
rebuttable presumption in place.
    But even given that, you know, my thought, and I think the 
Chairman just suggested this as well, it seems to me that there 
should be more of these on the list, more businesses on the 
list. I don't know, you will have to help me out as well, too, 
from a jurisdictional standpoint, because I know there is a 
statute that governs the Uyghurs issue that doesn't necessarily 
cover all of the minerals or other types of forced labor. I 
guess fishing is another one of those, too, so there may be a 
separate statute that deals with that. Help walk us through 
which ones cover which, and if there are different types of 
resources or legislative fixes or regulatory fixes that we 
might need to take to address each.
    But the Entity List is a big deal for me. The task force 
was another one. When I took a look at the statute and I saw I 
think it is like seven Federal agencies, and that struck me as 
maybe too many cooks in the kitchen. I have been in and out of 
Government for a long time, and I know sometimes, you know, we 
can get a little more bureaucratic than we need to, and, you 
know, especially when you have multiple departments that are 
involved. I wasn't able to see if there is somebody who gets to 
make the final call and pull the trigger there, because that 
might be one of the types of things that we need to revise. I 
think the task force may be a statutory arrangement. So if that 
is on us, you know, let us know, and we will try and figure out 
a way to fix that.
    De minimis, the Chair, discussed that already.
    Another thing that I remember from the first hearing that I 
found disturbing was the release order issue. My recollection 
of that, and you might have to set me straight on it, but 
sometimes the Government would seize materials that we had 
determined had been generated or had been connected or tainted 
by forced labor. But it sounded like instead of us, you know, 
retaining it or selling it or something like that, that we 
released it again. The concern I had about that was, you know, 
how does that actually punish the entity that was involved in 
this supply chain I'll call it a snafu, just to not be 
judgmental about it? But we don't want to do something that 
allows them to continue to profit from whatever that material 
was.
    So if I am mistaken on that, please let me know. But if we 
are releasing these materials back to the entities and they are 
still benefiting and profiting from the materials that the 
Government has now identified was somehow--you know, there was 
value-added based on forced labor, I don't think that is the 
right way to go, and I am hoping we can figure out a way to 
address that.
    So I look forward to your testimony. This is not an area 
that is my strong suit, so I am here to really listen and learn 
from what you are saying. I want to be an active and engaged 
partner in making sure that whatever it is that you all need, 
additional resources or, you know, statutory language or 
regulatory assistance or support, we want to make sure we get 
that to you because this is a critical issue.
    Forced labor is a huge problem, obviously, for the people 
who are forced to do the labor. I think it is also a big 
problem for the United States and our labor community because 
it really puts businesses in the United States at a very unfair 
disadvantage. We want to make sure that we have a level playing 
field on that front.
    So with that, I yield back to the Chair, and thank you 
again for this hearing.
    Chairman Bishop. As customary, Ranking Member Ivey opens 
with a very thoughtful and incisive opening statement.
    So I want to remind other Members of the committee that 
opening statements may be submitted for the record.
    [The statement of Ranking Member Thompson follows:]
             Statement of Ranking Member Bennie G. Thompson
                            January 11, 2024
    I am pleased that we are holding this subcommittee hearing to 
discuss the Biden administration's efforts to implement the Uyghur 
Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA).
    The Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities in the Xinjiang region of 
China have been systematically targeted by the Chinese government, 
repressed for their religious beliefs, and exploited for their labor.
    The State Department noted in its most recent human rights report 
that the Chinese government has subjected the predominately Muslim 
Uyghur population to arbitrary imprisonment, forced sterilization, 
coerced abortions, rape, torture, and forced labor. UFLPA is an 
important means of combatting and addressing the genocide of the Uyghur 
people.
    The bipartisan law--signed by President Biden 2 years ago--
represents an ambitious new mandate to prohibit goods from entering the 
United States that were made wholly or in part using forced labor from 
the Xinjiang region of China. UFLPA provided the Department of Homeland 
Security (DHS) just 6 months to establish new policies and procedures, 
hire critical personnel, and begin enforcement.
    I look forward to hearing about how DHS and its partners--including 
the Department of Labor--have carried out this important work in the 18 
months since the law went into effect. As with all new efforts, there 
are likely lessons to learn and areas to improve. However, what I don't 
doubt is DHS's commitment to fully enforcing UFLPA, as its efforts to 
date show.
    Consistent with the law, DHS has developed a strategy to prevent 
the importation of goods made with forced labor from China and provided 
an annual update to this strategy. DHS also publicly identifies 
businesses that benefit from Uyghur forced labor on its ``Entity 
List.'' To date, DHS has listed 30 such businesses and continues to add 
more. These businesses are prohibited from importing goods into the 
United States absent compelling evidence that they have undertaken 
efforts to remove forced labor from their supply chain.
    Finally, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has stopped over 
6,300 shipments--valued at over $2 billion--to examine compliance with 
the law. CBP has denied entry to more than 2,500 of these shipments, 
valued at over $500 million. But DHS has not done this work alone. DHS 
relies on a number of Federal partners through the Forced Labor 
Enforcement Task Force, including the Department of Labor.
    The Department of Labor's Bureau of International Labor Affairs 
provides subject-matter expertise on forced labor, supply chain 
tracing, and due diligence to support UFLPA's implementation. The 
Bureau also serves as co-chair of the UFLPA Entity List Subcommittee to 
help identify businesses associated with Uyghur forced labor.
    Additionally, the Bureau plays a key role in ensuring that goods 
made with forced labor do not enter the United States from Mexico and 
Canada by monitoring for adherence to the terms of our collective trade 
agreement. Ultimately, importers are responsible for knowing their 
supply chain, avoiding forced labor, and following the law.
    However, today, I hope to learn what else Congress can do to 
support DHS, the Department of Labor, and the rest of the Federal 
Government in their efforts to ensure that importers fulfill their 
responsibilities under UFLPA.
    In closing, I thank the Chairman and Ranking Member Ivey for 
holding this hearing on a topic of bipartisan interest. We all 
recognize the success of UFLPA is vital to upholding our Nation's 
commitment to the Uyghur people and standing against forced labor in 
China.

    Chairman Bishop. With our thanks to all of the witnesses 
for being here today, I ask that you please rise and raise your 
right hands.
    [Witnesses sworn.]
    Chairman Bishop. Let the record reflect that the witnesses 
have answered in the affirmative. Thank you. Please be seated.
    Let me now formally introduce our witnesses. Ms. Christa 
Brzozowski is the acting assistant secretary for Trade and 
Economic Security Policy in the Office of Strategy, Policy, and 
Plans of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Mr. Eric 
Choy is the executive director of the Trade Remedy Law 
Enforcement Directorate at the U.S. Customs and Border 
Protections Office of Trade. Ms. Thea Lee is the deputy under 
secretary for international affairs in the Bureau of 
International Labor Affairs of the U.S. Department of Labor.
    I thank all of the witnesses for being here, and I now 
recognize Ms. Christa Brzozowski for 5 minutes for her opening 
statement.

 STATEMENT OF CHRISTA BRZOZOWSKI, ACTING ASSISTANT SECRETARY, 
TRADE AND ECONOMIC SECURITY POLICY, OFFICE OF STRATEGY, POLICY, 
             AND PLANS, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF TREASURY

    Ms. Brzozowski. Thank you so much. Good morning, Chairman 
Bishop, Ranking Member Ivey, and distinguished Members of the 
subcommittee. Thank you again for the opportunity today to 
discuss the work of the Department of Homeland Security and the 
Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force to combat forced labor and 
global supply chains, including from the People's Republic of 
China or the PRC.
    U.S. laws that prohibit importation of goods made with 
forced labor were established almost 100 years ago in the 
Tariff Act of 1930. The laws reflect our values to honor 
freedom and to protect human rights. They also serve to protect 
American workers and legitimate businesses from those who 
exploit the vulnerable for their own financial gain.
    Congress established the Forced Labor Enforcement Task 
Force, or FLETF, in 2020 to facilitate a holistic approach to 
combating the scourge of forced labor by leveraging the 
authorities of the member agencies to ensure the U.S. 
Government is doing everything in its power to eradicate forced 
labor from supply chains.
    Then, in 2021, Congress passed and the President signed 
into law the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, or UFLPA. This 
is the strongest tool the United States or any other country 
has forged in the fight against the atrocities of forced labor. 
The bipartisan passage of the law was a strong signal to malign 
actors that we would hold them accountable and that the United 
States will not be complicit in the exploitation of the 
oppressed.
    At DHS, we're very proud to enforce our Nation's forced 
labor laws. The Department utilizes resources and authorities 
across multiple operational components, including Customs and 
Border Protection, Homeland Security Investigations, and a 
center that we have that is focused exclusively on countering 
human trafficking to advance these goals.
    As the chair of the Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force, 
DHS, with the support and the leadership of the other agencies, 
is working hard to facilitate the flow of legitimate trade 
while collaborating with a wide range of stakeholders from 
across industry, civil society, and others to keep goods made 
with forced labor out of U.S. commerce.
    The efforts of DHS and the task force also complement the 
goals and objectives of a new center set up under DHS, the 
Supply Chain Resilience Center, which seeks to minimize 
disruptions from all hazards that threaten the supply of key 
goods and services, including the risks of unsustainable supply 
chains that involve the use of forced labor.
    Congress incorporated several key components of the law 
that make it uniquely powerful in addressing the PRC's state-
sponsored cruel and inhumane forced labor regime, including the 
Entities List and a rebuttable presumption enforcement 
mechanism, and we appreciate those strong tools. The task force 
identified 20 entities for the inaugural Entity List and 
developed the practices and procedures since then for additions 
to the list as warranted by the facts and the law. As a result 
of those legal guidelines, the task force has expanded the 
Entities List by 50 percent, adding two new entities since June 
2022, and there is an active pipeline of recommendations being 
developed now by the task force.
    DHS is conducting a strategic review of every aspect of 
this process. We're working closely with our colleagues across 
the members of the task force, and our goal is to identify 
process improvements that can result in a transparent, 
consistent, and, importantly, a scalable process that will 
allow us to significantly increase the numbers of entities 
included on the Entity List.
    We have established a team--DHS has established a team 
within my office that is solely devoted to the development and 
the administration of the Entity List. We have sought out 
subject-matter experts who are critical to our understanding of 
the ever-changing Chinese corporate landscape. While we have 
shifted considerable resources toward this very important 
mission, we look forward to working with Congress to sustain 
efforts to fulfill even further this law's mandate.
    Since the implementation of the law, DHS has seen 
significant evidence that industry is taking responsibility of 
understanding their supply chains seriously, including by 
shifting and diversifying the supply chains. We think this is a 
positive development.
    I thank the subcommittee for your support in the fight 
against forced labor and for the opportunity to appear here 
today, and I look forward to the discussion and to your 
questions. Thank you.
    [The prepared statement of Mr. Brzozowski follows:]
                Prepared Statement of Christa Brzozowski
                            January 11, 2024
                              introduction
    Good morning, Chairman Bishop, Ranking Member Ivey, and 
distinguished Members of the subcommittee. Thank you for the 
opportunity to discuss the work of the Department of Homeland Security 
(DHS or the Department) and the Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force 
(FLETF) to combat forced labor in global supply chains, including from 
the People's Republic of China's (PRC) systematic use of forced labor 
of certain ethnic and religious minorities.
    U.S. laws that prohibit importation of goods made with forced labor 
were established almost 100 years ago in the Tariff Act of 1930, as we 
recognized the harm that can result from allowing these goods to enter 
our markets. The laws reflect our values--to honor freedom and protect 
human rights. They also serve to protect American workers and 
legitimate businesses from those who exploit the vulnerable for their 
own financial gain.
    At DHS, we are proud to enforce our Nation's forced labor laws. 
These laws align with the administration's objectives to advance the 
rights of workers around the world, as outlined in President Biden's 
November 2023 memorandum on advancing worker empowerment, rights, and 
high labor standards globally. The memorandum represents the first 
whole-of-Government approach to advance workers' rights by directing 
Federal departments and agencies to elevate labor rights in their work 
abroad.
    DHS reinforces that commitment with its own initiatives. In early 
2023, the Department released the Quadrennial Homeland Security Review, 
which added combatting crimes of exploitation, including labor 
exploitation, as the sixth DHS mission. The Department continues to 
utilize resources and authorities from multiple operational components, 
including U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), Immigration and 
Customs Enforcement's Homeland Security Investigations, and the cross-
component Center for Countering Human Trafficking to advance our goals 
in this critical mission.
    But DHS is not alone in this fight. Recognizing the breadth and 
depth of the Executive branch's experience and knowledge in our battle 
to end forced labor, Congress established the FLETF to facilitate a 
holistic approach to combatting this scourge. The interagency Task 
Force leverages the authorities of its member agencies to ensure the 
U.S. Government is doing everything in its power to eradicate forced 
labor from supply chains. The FLETF drives initiatives that support 
enforcement and enhance compliance, utilizing the resources and 
expertise of member agencies--DHS, along with the Departments of State, 
Labor, Commerce, Justice, and Treasury, and the Office of the U.S. 
Trade Representative--to collectively fulfill Congress' intent.
    I am honored to support the Department's Under Secretary for 
Strategy, Policy, and Plans, Robert Silvers, in his role as Chair of 
the FLETF. Under the leadership of Secretary Mayorkas, and with the 
unwavering support from leadership of the other FLETF agencies, DHS is 
facilitating the flow of legitimate trade while collaborating with a 
wide range of stakeholders from industry and civil society to keep 
goods made with forced labor out of U.S. commerce.
    The efforts of DHS and the FLETF also complement the goals and 
objectives of DHS's new Supply Chain Resilience Center within DHS's 
Office of Strategy, Policy, and Plans. The new center will enhance the 
Department's position to minimize disruptions from all hazards that 
threaten the supply of key goods and services and promote economic 
security. Toward that end, the center will produce a variety of tools 
and resources, to include current best practices, recommendations for 
process and policy enhancements, informational reports, and analysis to 
help the private sector identify, assess, and close risks to their 
supply chains, including the risks of unsustainable supply chains that 
involve the use of forced labor.
             the uyghur forced labor prevention act (uflpa)
    The United States has long recognized and condemned the PRC's on-
going genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and members 
of other ethnic and religious minority groups in the Xinjiang Uyghur 
Autonomous Region of China. These crimes involve abhorrent abuses, 
including arbitrary imprisonment, detention, torture, forced 
sterilization, sexual and physical assault, family separation, and 
cultural persecution.
    The PRC also inflicts systematic forced labor on Uyghurs and other 
persecuted minority groups in the region, who must work in the mining, 
production, and manufacturing of goods. Civil society and other 
reporting indicate that the PRC uses Government directives to threaten 
anyone that would resist working in these ``poverty alleviation'' and 
other programs with detention or internment. The goods resulting from 
this exploitation are exported all over the world and found in the 
clothes we wear, the food we eat, and the vehicles we drive.
    Recognizing the horrors of the PRC's state-sponsored forced labor 
programs, Congress passed, and the President signed into law, the 
Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) in December 2021--the 
strongest tool the United States or any other country has forged in the 
fight against the atrocities of forced labor. The bipartisan passage of 
the UFLPA was a strong signal to malign actors that we would hold them 
accountable, and that the United States will not stand by and be 
complicit in the exploitation of the oppressed.
    Charged with full implementation of the UFLPA in 180 days, the 
agencies of the FLETF worked tirelessly to develop and implement a 
comprehensive and multi-pronged strategy to prevent the importation of 
goods made with forced labor in the PRC, and especially those made with 
the forced labor of Uyghurs and members of other ethnic and religious 
minority groups from Xinjiang.
    Congress incorporated several key components into the UFLPA that 
make it uniquely powerful in addressing the PRC's state-sponsored cruel 
and inhumane forced labor regime. The UFLPA requires the FLETF to 
publicly identify certain bad actors that meet the UFLPA Entity List 
criteria. The UFLPA also includes a key enforcement mechanism: a 
rebuttable presumption that goods mined, produced, or manufactured 
wholly or in part in Xinjiang, or by entities identified on the UFLPA 
Entity List, are prohibited from importation into the United States. 
DHS, and specifically CBP, has devoted significant efforts to enforcing 
the rebuttable presumption under the law.
                 the uflpa strategy and the entity list
    As chair of the FLETF, DHS led the development of the UFLPA's 
comprehensive strategy to prevent importation of goods made with forced 
labor from the PRC. A critical element of that development involved the 
FLETF's collaboration and engagement with key stakeholders across 
government, industry, civil society, and like-minded international 
partners.
    Almost immediately after passage of the UFLPA, the FLETF began an 
extensive engagement campaign with industry and non-governmental 
organizations (NGO's), so that the benefit of these stakeholders' 
perspectives and expertise could be incorporated in the FLETF's 
implementation of the UFLPA and the development of an overarching 
strategy.
    The UFLPA also called for the Department of State, our FLETF 
partner, to develop and implement a comprehensive diplomatic strategy 
to collaborate with like-minded international partners toward a global 
response in eradicating forced labor from legitimate trade. The 
diplomatic strategy was transmitted to Congress in April 2022, and sets 
forth the United States' whole-of-Government approach toward increasing 
awareness of and addressing forced labor in Xinjiang with our partners 
abroad.
    Armed with information from stakeholder engagements and our Federal 
partners, the FLETF's strategy provides extensive guidance for 
importers, drawing from the Department of Labor's (DOL) Comply Chain 
expertise on due diligence in examining supply chains and established a 
framework for robust partnerships with industry and civil society.
    As part of the UFLPA Strategy, the FLETF identified 20 entities for 
the inaugural UFLPA Entity List. Following the passage of the UFLPA, 
FLETF member agencies consulted and collaborated, utilizing their 
knowledge and expertise in administering other sanctions regimes, to 
develop and establish the practices and procedures that would guide 
FLETF agencies in building recommendations for additions to the Entity 
List, as warranted by the facts and the law.
    As a result of those guidelines, the FLETF has expanded the Entity 
List by 50 percent, adding 10 new entities since June 2022. DHS and the 
FLETF are committed to continuing our expansion of the Entity List, and 
fulfilling Congress' intent to shine a light on entities that benefit 
from the exploitation of Uyghurs and other persecuted minorities.
    DHS has an extraordinary partnership with civil society, whose 
research and monitoring efforts are critical to our understanding of 
forced labor schemes and efforts to obscure the true origin of goods. 
Through our collaboration with NGO's and the development of our own 
knowledge base, the FLETF continues to expand our expertise in 
identifying and assessing suspected entities, and we anticipate more 
additions to the UFLPA Entity List in the coming months. There is an 
active pipeline of referrals that our agencies are examining, and we 
will continue to move expeditiously to act on these referrals.
    Working closely with our esteemed colleague from the DOL, Deputy 
Under Secretary Thea Lee and her staff, the FLETF established an Entity 
List Subcommittee, co-chaired by DHS and DOL. The subcommittee draws on 
its collective experience with other sanction and enforcement regimes 
involving forced labor to support and guide our FLETF partner agencies 
in developing recommendations and establishing best practices.
    The Department continues to review and refine the Entity List 
process to better implement Congress' intent for the UFLPA. Internally, 
DHS is examining our own processes to identify where we can be more 
effective. With experience in building the Entity List and with new 
expertise added to the team, DHS is conducting a strategic review of 
every aspect of this process: from the way we receive and analyze 
information about potential entities, to our analysis of trends and 
patterns that can direct us to other suspect supply chains, and finally 
to our collaborations with our FLETF partner agencies in making our 
determinations. The goal is to identify improvements that can result in 
a transparent, consistent, and scalable process that will allow the 
FLETF to significantly increase the number of entities it can identify 
as meeting the UFLPA's statutory standards for the Entity List.
    While we gain proficiency with each recommendation and explore how 
we can improve our processes, the FLETF does face challenges in 
expanding the Entity List. All FLETF agencies are committed to holding 
malign actors accountable for their facilitation and utilization of the 
PRC's state-sponsored forced labor programs. But, as the United States' 
actions under the UFLPA are gaining attention both here and abroad, 
those illicit actors that benefit from the use of forced labor seek new 
ways to obscure the true origin of their goods and circumvent our 
enforcement of the law.
    Companies connected to forced labor in the PRC deploy a wide array 
of strategies to hide their wrongdoing, including erasing publicly-
available evidence, shuffling ownership of subsidiaries, renaming 
companies known to be involved in forced labor, or bifurcating their 
supply chains so that they can maintain a forced labor-tainted supply 
chain while still attempting to sell in the U.S. market. We must stay 
ahead of those efforts, which are becoming more sophisticated as the 
level of scrutiny increases.
    To meet the UFLPA's mandate related to the UFLPA Strategy and the 
UFLPA Entity List, FLETF agencies have shifted considerable resources 
from other priorities to meet this mission. DHS itself has established 
a team within my office solely devoted to development and 
administration of the UFLPA Entity List, and we have brought on 
subject-matter experts who are critical to our understanding of the 
ever-changing Chinese corporate landscape, including connections with 
PRC-sponsored programs and directives. We appreciate Congress' support, 
and we look forward to working with Congress to sustain efforts to 
fulfill the UFLPA mandate.
     engagements with the private sector and the response to uflpa
    We recognize that the committee's focus today is on UFLPA 
enforcement. However, we would be remiss if we did not highlight 
another critical element of the UFLPA's strategy--to engage and support 
the trade community in its effort to implement effective due diligence 
protocols that provide transparency and traceability in its supply 
chains and identify the possible use of forced labor in their supply 
chains. To this end, DHS and CBP have held more than 600 engagements 
since passage of the UFLPA, to include representatives from industry, 
the NGO community, international partners, and Congress. These 
engagements provide the opportunity to arm the trade community with 
additional information and guidance so they can enhance their own 
compliance programs and conduct effective due diligence. But these 
dialogs also inform us of the challenges that industry faces.
    DHS and CBP continuously review information to determine what can 
be shared with the trade community, whether through CBP's Digital 
Dashboard which provides categorized information on detentions made 
under the UFLPA, or guidance on current best practices for importers in 
providing documentation that traces a shipment's entire supply chain. 
With the growing availability of technological tools to monitor and 
verify supply chains, DHS showcased many of these resources in CBP's 
March 2023 Forced Labor Technology Expo, highlighting the different 
mechanisms by which importers can build a robust due diligence program.
    We have found that the vast majority of industry leaders are as 
repulsed by forced labor as the Department--they share our values and 
our abhorrence of these crimes. But, while we support the trade 
community's efforts to conduct supply chains due diligence and fully 
comply with the UFLPA's requirements, we remind them that the 
consequences of producing goods made, wholly or in part, with forced 
labor or importing such goods will be severe, and that they will be 
held fully accountable for their failure to conduct effective due 
diligence.
    Following implementation of the UFLPA rebuttable presumption, DHS 
has seen significant evidence that industry is taking compliance 
seriously. We are still in the early stages of quantifying the impact 
of the UFLPA on private-sector behavior, but early data shows 
significant promise.
    Various supply chain mapping and verification technology companies 
report a significant decrease in transactions from entities potentially 
subject to enforcement under the UFLPA. Additionally, extensive 
anecdotal reporting from the trade community indicates that industry is 
taking steps to ensure compliance, including moving their supply chains 
out of Xinjiang and diversifying away from suppliers that cannot 
deliver the requisite transparency.
    We have even learned that some Chinese companies are refusing to 
participate in PRC forced labor programs to avoid the risk of losing 
access to the lucrative U.S. market. In response to the UFLPA, some 
companies looking to secure their supply chains are re-shoring and 
sourcing from suppliers in the United States, to the benefit of 
domestic producers that have struggled with China's domination in 
certain industry sectors.
                               conclusion
    With the passage of the UFLPA, the United States has an increased 
ability to prevent goods resulting from the PRC's on-going human rights 
abuse against Uyghurs and members of other ethnic and religious 
minority groups from entering U.S. commerce. With each shipment of 
tainted goods that is denied entry into the United States, we take 
another step toward justice, accountability, and fair competition. DHS 
and the FLETF are always mindful that there is real human suffering 
behind the goods that try to make their insidious way into legitimate 
markets. And that is why we are so committed to right this wrong.
    We are proud to contribute, in partnership with our partner 
agencies in the FLETF and with Congress, to the impact of this landmark 
legislation. We recognize there is more we can accomplish, but with the 
collective will of Congress, the Executive branch, and our like-minded 
stakeholders, we can remove the financial incentives that support the 
use of forced labor and advance toward our goal of eliminating these 
goods from global supply chains.
    I thank the subcommittee for your support in our fight against 
forced labor, and for the opportunity to appear before you today. I 
look forward to taking your questions.

    Chairman Bishop. Thank you, Mr. Brzozowski.
    I now recognize Mr. Choy for 5 minutes.

 STATEMENT OF ERIC CHOY, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, TRADE REMEDY LAW 
  ENFORCEMENT DIRECTORATE, U.S. CUSTOMS AND BORDER PROTECTION

    Mr. Choy. Good morning, Chairman Bishop, Ranking Member 
Ivey, and distinguished Members of the subcommittee. It's an 
honor to testify today on U.S. Customs and Border Protection's 
role in enforcing the forced labor laws and regulations of the 
United States, including the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention 
Act, or UFLPA.
    Forced labor is an abhorrent issue, abuse of human rights. 
It not only affects the living and working conditions of 
millions of workers around the world, but it also creates 
unfair competition for U.S. business. As part of our critical 
mission to uphold our Nation's laws and facilitate legitimate 
trade, CBP is committed to preventing goods produced or 
manufactured with forced labor from entering U.S. commerce and 
promoting accountability for the on-going genocide and crimes 
against humanity afflicting Uyghurs and other religious and 
ethnic minority groups in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous 
Region, or the XUAR, of the People's Republic of China.
    Since the law took effect in June 2022, CBP has stopped 
more than 6,000 shipments of goods valued at more than $2 
billion for UFLPA-related enforcement actions. Using resources 
provided by Congress, CBP is strengthening our forced labor 
enforcement efforts by investing in personnel, training, 
outreach, technology, and laboratory science capabilities. The 
agency is using technology to map supply chains and research 
high-risk commodities to ensure supply chains are free of 
forced labor inputs.
    CBP is also increasing its analytical and threat detection 
capabilities. Through our advanced trade analytic platform, CBP 
developed and operationalized analytic models that identify 
entities operating in the XUAR, their affiliates, and entities 
with whom they share traits or characteristics and indicators 
of evasion to further our analysis and enforcement efforts 
related to the UFLPA.
    Due to the success of utilizing these tools for UFLPA 
enforcement, CBP also adopted similar methodologies to identify 
routes by which fentanyl and pill presses enter the United 
States.
    To support compliance efforts, in March 2023, CBP held a 
forced labor technical expo to provide private industry the 
opportunity to highlight tools and technologies that promote 
due diligence. We issue guidance, resources for importers, and 
developed an interactive dashboard with statistics on UFLPA 
enforcement that provides insights on stopped entries by 
industry sector and country of export.
    Enforcement alone is not sufficient. CBP continues to 
engage with industry and importers to remind them to exercise 
reasonable care to ensure goods entering the United States 
comply with all laws and regulations. Companies have the most 
extensive insights into their supply chains and the 
responsibility to monitor their supply chains. CBP encourages 
companies to conduct audits, risk assessments, and other acts 
of due diligence. In fiscal year 2023, CBP conducted more than 
500 such engagements, resulting in improved trade facilitation 
for compliant importers.
    Although CBP is--additionally, through CBP's 21st Century 
Customs Framework Strategic Initiative, we engaged with our 
stakeholders on ways to refine CBP's regulatory and statutory 
framework to enhance and streamline forced labor enforcement 
efforts. We welcome the opportunity to work with Congress to 
address these challenges and advance these initiatives 
together.
    CBP's forced labor enforcement efforts are robust and 
effective, but we do face challenges. The record-level volume 
of de minimis or low-value shipments contain less detailed data 
available for CBP review. De minimis status does not exempt 
shipments from CBP review for violations of law, and there is 
no exception for de minimis shipments under UFLPA. CBP is 
firmly committed to meeting challenges in the de minimis 
context, including undertaking initiatives to increase 
information availability and assess risk. The agency is working 
closely with DHS to develop strategies to address these 
challenges that include regulatory changes to increase data 
collection and technology enhancements to improve risk 
management and targeting. We also look forward to working with 
Congress on these initiatives.
    CBP's enforcement efforts safeguard all industries from 
unfair trade practices. However, some industries, such as 
textiles, were highlighted in the UFLPA and have seen increased 
scrutiny due to the open-source reporting on the use of forced 
labor in the production of raw materials used in their supply 
chains. Nearly 17 percent of all shipments stopped by CBP for 
UFLPA reviews are textiles, including apparel and footwear, and 
approximately 63 percent of these shipments were denied for 
noncompliance.
    In addition to UFLPA enforcement actions in fiscal year 
2023, CBP seized more than 5,000 textile shipments; issued 
approximately 19 million in commercial fraud penalties; and 
conducted audits, laboratory analysis, and factory verification 
visits to identify more than 2 million additional duties owed 
to the Government.
    CBP continues to strengthen targeting enforcement 
activities across all industries to prevent and penalize those 
who violate and circumvent tariffs and trade laws, including 
forced labor. CBP's forced labor enforcement efforts not only 
ensure fair competition and economic security for us domestic 
industry, they also have a direct effect on the improvement of 
living and working conditions for workers across the world, 
including the repayment of millions of withheld wages and 
recruitment fees that trap workers in debt bondage.
    We appreciate this subcommittee's continued support and we 
are grateful that Congress has entrusted us with this important 
mission. I'm proud of the incredibly hard work that my 
colleagues at CBP have undertaken in response. I look forward 
to your questions.
    [The prepared statement of Mr. Choy follows:]
                    Prepared Statement of Eric Choy
                            January 11, 2024
                              introduction
    Chairman Bishop, Ranking Member Ivey, and Members of the 
subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to discuss U.S. Customs and 
Border Protection's (CBP) role in enforcing the forced labor laws and 
regulations of the United States, including the Uyghur Forced Labor 
Prevention Act (UFLPA) and Section 307 of the Tariff Act of 1930.\1\ I 
am honored to represent the dedicated men and women of CBP who work 
tirelessly to uphold our Nation's laws and facilitate legitimate trade 
to protect our Nation's economy to ensure consumer safety and create a 
level playing field for American businesses.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \1\ 19 U.S.C. Sec. 1307.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Forced labor is an abhorrent abuse of human rights and an unfair 
trade practice. CBP is committed to eliminating forced labor practices 
in U.S. supply chains and promoting accountability for the on-going 
genocide and crimes against humanity afflicting Uyghurs and other 
religious and ethnic minority groups in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous 
Region (XUAR) of the People's Republic of China (PRC) through its 
enforcement of the UFLPA rebuttable presumption.
               cbp's forced labor enforcement activities
    Playing a key role in the Department of Homeland Security (DHS)-led 
Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force (FLETF), CBP is responsible for 
enforcing the UFLPA and preventing entry of products made with forced 
labor into U.S. commerce.
    As described in the FLETF's Strategy to Prevent the Importation of 
Goods Mined, Produced, or Manufactured with Forced Labor in the 
People's Republic of China,\2\ the UFLPA charges CBP with enforcement 
of a rebuttable presumption that importation of goods mined, produced, 
or manufactured wholly or in part in Xinjiang, or produced by entities 
identified in the UFLPA Entity List,\3\ are prohibited under Section 
307 of the Tariff Act of 1930, as amended (19 U.S.C. Sec. 1307) and not 
entitled to entry to the United States. Using resources provided by 
Congress, CBP leverages all available tools to enforce the UFLPA by 
applying a sophisticated, risk-based approach utilizing dynamic 
intelligence, analysis, and data-driven targeting to identify shipments 
that warrant further scrutiny while facilitating legitimate trade and 
support of human rights.
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    \2\ https://www.dhs.gov/uflpa-strategy.
    \3\ The UFLPA Entity list is developed from recommendations 
submitted by FLETF member agencies based on the examination of 
information from a wide variety of sources, including trade data, 
reports from civil society organizations, news reports, and other 
public and non-public information. The decision to add an entity to the 
UFLPA Entity List is determined by majority vote of FLETF member 
agencies.
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    Since the UFLPA's rebuttable presumption took effect in June 2022, 
CBP has stopped more than 6,000 shipments of goods valued at more than 
$2 billion for UFLPA-related enforcement action review.\4\ CBP made a 
final entry decision on 5,062 of these shipments, including 2,598 
shipments, or 51 percent, which were denied entry to the United States. 
To date, CBP has received 5 requests for an exception to the rebuttable 
presumption, which the Commissioner of CBP may grant if, among other 
requirements, CBP determines the importer has provided clear and 
convincing evidence that the goods subject to the rebuttable 
presumption were not produced wholly or in part by forced labor. In 
each case, importers have withdrawn their request for an exception 
prior to CBP making its final determination.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \4\ https://www.cbp.gov/newsroom/stats/trade/uyghur-forced-labor-
prevention-act-statistics.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Separately from the UFLPA, when CBP investigates forced labor 
allegations and has reasonable suspicion of the use of forced labor in 
the manufacturing or production of goods entering the United States, it 
issues a Withhold Release Order (WRO) that allows CBP to detain the 
goods in question at all U.S. ports of entry (POEs) until or unless 
importers can prove the absence of forced labor in their supply chain. 
In addition, CBP issues a Finding when the agency determines, based 
upon probable cause, that forced labor was used in the manufacturing or 
production of goods, which allows CBP to seize and forfeit the goods in 
question at all POEs and prevent the merchandise from being imported 
into the United States.\5\
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    \5\ A list of current WROs can be found at https://www.cbp.gov/
trade/forced-labor/withhold-release-orders-and-findings.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    In addition, once a WRO or Finding is issued, an impacted entity 
may file a modification petition to provide evidence to CBP that the 
forced labor conditions are fully addressed and resolved. CBP will 
evaluate this evidence and may choose to modify a WRO or Finding, as 
appropriate. CBP considers issuance of a modification to be a 
successful outcome in the effort to eradicate forced labor from supply 
chains.
    In fiscal year 2023, CBP issued 1 WRO and modified 1 Finding and 3 
WROs. Over the past 4 years, CBP's forced labor enforcement efforts 
resulted in the improvement of living and working conditions for tens 
of thousands of workers including repayment of more than $62 million in 
withheld wages and recruitment fees trapping workers in debt bondage.
Industry-Specific Enforcement
    CBP employs a dynamic, risk-based approach to enforcement that 
prioritizes action against the highest-risk goods based on current data 
and intelligence to prevent prohibited goods from entering the United 
States. CBP enforcement efforts safeguard all industries from unfair 
trade practices. However, some industries, such as solar and textiles, 
have seen increased scrutiny due to open-source reporting on the use of 
forced labor in the production of raw materials used in their supply 
chains.
    The domestic textile industry is critical to the U.S. economy, 
employing more than half-a-million people in this country. Because 
imported textiles typically carry a higher duty rate compared to other 
U.S. imports, with some as high as 32 percent, violators try to lower 
costs through unlawful practices. For example, violators use forced 
labor to lower manufacturing costs or misrepresent the country of 
origin and mislabel and undervalue shipments to circumvent trade 
duties. These types of activities, which undermine legitimate trade, 
can be the result of human rights abuses, and threaten U.S. jobs, are a 
continuous focus for CBP enforcement.
    Regarding forced labor enforcement, nearly 17 percent of all 
shipments stopped by CBP for UFLPA review since June 2022 were 
textiles, including apparel and footwear. Of these shipments, CBP 
released 29 percent after a thorough review process by our Apparel, 
Footwear, and Textiles Center of Excellence and Expertise to confirm 
the supply chains for those shipments were free of any materials 
produced in XUAR or by companies on the UFLPA Entity List. Of all the 
shipments reviewed by CBP for UFLPA compliance, approximately 63 
percent were denied entry based on the importer's failure to determine 
the shipments were free of any materials produced in XUAR or by 
companies on the UFLPA Entity List.
    In addition to UFLPA enforcement actions, in fiscal year 2023, CBP 
seized more than 5,000 textile shipments valued at more than $129 
million, issued approximately $19.3 million in commercial fraud 
penalties, and conducted audits that identified over $2 million in 
additional duty owed to CBP.\6\ Additionally, CBP conducted laboratory 
analysis on 323 shipments, 42 percent of which were found to be mis-
declared or mis-described when arriving in the United States. CBP also 
conducted 57 factory verification visits around the world through its 
Textile Production Verification Team program resulting in approximately 
$340,000 in duties recovered and potential further enforcement action. 
CBP continues to strengthen targeting and enforcement activities within 
this industry to prevent and penalize individuals and entities 
violating or circumventing textile tariffs and trade laws--including 
forced labor--thus ensuring fair competition and economic security for 
U.S. domestic industry.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \6\ See www.cbp.gov/trade/priority-issues/textiles/textile-
enforcement-statistics.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Industry Compliance and Due Diligence Support
    In conjunction with our enforcement activities, DHS and CBP are 
committed to supporting industry's forced labor compliance and due 
diligence efforts. Recognizing the value of predictability to our trade 
partners, CBP is committed to providing consistent processing and 
uniformity of practices across all POEs through our Centers of 
Excellence and Expertise (Centers)\7\--including forced labor 
enforcement. Centers include subject-matter experts that are focused on 
industry-specific areas to increase facilitation and maximize trade 
enforcement Nation-wide. They are an essential part of our forced labor 
enforcement efforts, providing timely, efficient reviews of shipments 
from law-abiding importers and good-faith trade actors and releasing 
legitimate shipments into U.S. commerce in as quickly as 7-14 days, on 
average. CBP invested in, and continues to provide, training to its 
officers Nation-wide who inspect shipments subject to the UFLPA, to 
Center import specialists who review supply chain documentation for 
connections to the XUAR, and to its regulatory auditors who review 
supply chain tracing information during audits of high-risk companies 
for forced labor.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \7\ See www.cbp.gov/trade/centers-excellence-and-expertise-
information.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    CBP continues to engage with industry and importers to remind them 
to exercise reasonable care and take all necessary and appropriate 
steps to ensure goods entering the United States comply with all laws 
and regulations. Companies have the most extensive insight into their 
supply chains and a responsibility to proactively monitor their supply 
chains to mitigate the risk of importing goods into the United States 
that were produced with forced labor. CBP encourages companies to 
conduct thorough independent, third-party audits, risk assessments, and 
increased supply chain transparency, in addition to other acts of due 
diligence, including isotopic testing to determine geographic origins 
of materials such as cotton.
    CBP acknowledges that many in the trade community may not have 
sufficient resources, expertise, or mechanisms to identify indicators 
of forced labor in their supply chains. To support our trade partners, 
in March 2023, CBP held a Forced Labor Technical Expo to provide 
private industry the opportunity to highlight tools and technologies 
that promote due diligence by enhancing transparency and verifying 
provenance of goods. We also issued guidance on best practices for 
importers to demonstrate their merchandise is not subject to the UFLPA 
based on lessons learned to date, including documentation that trace a 
given product through the entire supply chain.\8\ Additionally, CBP 
developed an interactive Dashboard with statistics on UFLPA enforcement 
that provides insight for the public on stopped entries by industry 
sector and country of export.\9\ As part of our commitment to 
transparency and accountability, we continue to assess what additional 
data we can publicly report.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \8\ See CBP Factsheets ``Due Diligence in Supply Chains,'' 
www.cbp.gov/document/fact-sheets/due-diligence-global-supply-chains, 
``Forced Labor--Importer Due Diligence,'' www.cbp.gov/document/fact-
sheets/forced-labor-importer-due-diligence, and Informed Compliance 
Publication, ``What Every Member of the Trade Community Should Know: 
Reasonable Care,'' www.cbp.gov/document/publications/reasonable-care.
    \9\ See www.cbp.gov/newsroom/stats/trade/uyghur-forced-labor-
prevention-act-statistics.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Private-sector engagement is a vital part of ensuring CBP is 
enforcing forced labor laws while facilitating ethical trade. CBP 
routinely engages with civil society organizations, private industry, 
and interagency stakeholders on matters related to forced labor 
enforcement. In fiscal year 2023, CBP conducted more than 500 such 
engagements, including coordination with industry on forced labor 
issues through the Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee and 
Forced Labor Working Group, resulting in improved trade facilitation 
for compliant importers while helping to ensure products entering the 
United States are free of forced labor. Collaboration with stakeholders 
is a critical component of all of CBP's trade enforcement efforts, and 
we are committed to continuing our high level of engagement with the 
trade community, including on matters specific to forced labor 
enforcement and compliance.
    Additionally, through CBP's 21st Century Customs Framework 
strategic initiative, we are also engaging with our stakeholders on 
ways to refine CBP's regulatory and statutory framework to enhance and 
streamline forced labor enforcement efforts. We welcome the opportunity 
to work with Congress to address these challenges, and advance these 
initiatives, together.
Enforcement Challenges and Initiatives
    CBP's forced labor enforcement efforts are robust and effective, 
but we do face challenges. For example, 19 U.S.C. 1321(a)(2)(C) 
provides for duty- and tax-free admission of a shipment of merchandise 
with an aggregate fair retail value in the country of shipment of $800 
or less, imported by 1 person in 1 day. These low-value, de minimis 
shipments could contain articles made with forced labor. Presently 
there are fewer data elements collected on de minimis shipments, but 
CBP and the Treasury Department are considering regulatory changes to 
increase the data available for review. This would help address risks 
these shipments present, including in the forced labor context. De 
minimis status does not exempt shipments from CBP review and 
interdiction for violations of law, and there is no exception for de 
minimis shipments under the UFLPA. CBP is firmly committed to meeting 
challenges in the de minimis context implicating forced labor, 
including undertaking initiatives to increase information availability 
and assess risk.
    Using the resources provided by Congress, CBP is strengthening our 
forced labor enforcement efforts by investing in personnel, training, 
outreach, technology, and laboratory science capabilities. The agency 
is using technology to map supply chains and research high-risk 
commodities to ensure supply chains are free of forced labor and XUAR 
inputs. Using funding provided by Congress, CBP is increasing its 
analytical and threat detection capabilities.
    CBP developed and operationalized analytic models that identify 
entities operating in XUAR, their affiliates, entities with whom they 
share traits or characteristics, and indicators of evasion activities 
(e.g., illegal transshipment) to help further our analysis and 
enforcement efforts related to UFLPA. Due to the success of utilizing 
these tools for UFLPA enforcement, CBP analysts adopted similar 
methodologies to identify routes by which fentanyl and pill presses 
were entering the United States.
                               conclusion
    Forced labor is a detestable violation and abuse of human rights 
and an unfair trade practice; eradicating its existence is an 
irrefutable moral imperative. CBP is committed to--and proud of--our 
role in combatting forced labor, upholding the rule of law, promoting 
respect for human rights, and promoting free and fair trade. CBP will 
continue enforcing the UFLPA through implementing the UFLPA rebuttable 
presumption and supporting our Government and industry partners.
    CBP appreciates the continued support of Congress to execute the 
full range of our trade enforcement and facilitation mission. We will 
continue to combat fraudulent trade practices and penalize violators, 
while promoting lawful trade and protecting domestic industry.
    Thank you for the opportunity to testify today. I look forward to 
your questions.

    Chairman Bishop. Thank you, Mr. Choy.
    I now recognize Ms. Thea Lee for 5 minutes for her opening 
statement.

   STATEMENT OF THEA LEE, DEPUTY SECRETARY FOR INTERNATIONAL 
AFFAIRS, BUREAU OF INTERNATIONAL LABOR AFFAIRS, U.S. DEPARTMENT 
                            OF LABOR

    Ms. Lee. Good morning, Chairman Bishop, Ranking Member 
Ivey, Members of the subcommittee. Thank you for the 
opportunity to testify today.
    Forced labor is all around us. It is an invisible thread in 
the fabric of global commerce, woven through the global supply 
chains of too many products and industries. Unraveling this 
thread requires a multipronged approach involving governments, 
business unions, consumers, journalists, academics, and civil 
society. With over 75 years of experience working at the 
intersection of labor rights, human rights and the global 
economy, the Department of Labor's Bureau of International 
Labor Affairs, or ILAB, is uniquely positioned to guide the 
U.S. Government's efforts to address forced labor throughout 
global supply chains. I would like to focus this morning on two 
areas of our work.
    First, ILAB's reporting and deep expertise bring attention 
to global labor abuses and provide a foundational knowledge 
that is used by our counterparts throughout the U.S. 
Government. Second, ILAB's holistic approach allows us to 
address forced labor from multiple perspectives, including in 
our role on the Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force and the 
implementation of the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act.
    ILAB is the leading provider of in-depth research on global 
labor abuses. Our 3 flagship reports serve as valuable 
resources for research, advocacy, Government action, and 
corporate responsibility.
    First, our annual findings on the worst forms of child 
labor assesses the efforts of U.S. trade beneficiary countries 
and territories to eliminate child labor through legislation, 
enforcement, policy, and social programs.
    Second, our list of products produced by forced or 
indentured child labor is intended to ensure that us Federal 
agencies do not procure goods made by forced or indentured 
child labor as required by Executive Order 13126.
    Third, our biennial list of goods produced by child labor 
or forced labor, also called the TVPRA, Trafficking Victims 
Protection Reauthorization Act list, serves as a sobering 
reminder of how labor exploitation infiltrates our daily lives 
through the coffee we drink, the produce we eat, and the 
garments we wear. The current TVPRA list includes 159 goods 
from 78 countries and areas. Of those goods, 18 are produced by 
forced labor in China, including several, like polysilicon, 
which is a key element in the production of solar panels, that 
involve the use of forced labor from the Xinjiang Uyghur 
Autonomous Region.
    Xinjiang is China's far western region, of course, where 
hundreds of thousands of Uyghurs, ethnic Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, and 
members of other persecuted groups are being arbitrarily 
detained and subjected to forced labor, producing goods that 
too often enter the U.S. domestic and global supply chains. The 
TVPRA list also includes lithium ion batteries from China made 
with cobalt that was found to be mined with child labor from 
the Democratic Republic of the Congo. These batteries are found 
in dozens of downstream products that we use in our daily 
lives, including computers, cell phones, vacuum cleaners, 
electric vehicles, and hearing aids.
    ILAB's supply chain research underlying the TVPRA list 
represents one of the most comprehensive efforts world-wide to 
identify labor risks in global supply chains. It supports our 
work to enforce U.S. trade laws, enabling ILAB to work with our 
partners across the administration and globally to combat 
forced labor and child labor in China, the DRC, and around the 
world.
    As an active and critical member of the Forced Labor 
Enforcement Task Force, ILAB is committed to contributing and 
leveraging our expertise to support our partner U.S. Government 
agencies to take enforcement actions to address labor rights 
abuses in global supply chains. ILAB has prioritized work on 
the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, which is an essential 
element in the Biden-Harris administration's efforts to 
eradicate forced labor from U.S. supply chains.
    Along with DHS, ILAB serves as co-chair of the task force's 
UFLPA Entity List subcommittee. My team worked closely with the 
other task force agencies developing a methodology and process 
to consider in reviewing additions to the Entity List. ILAB is 
committed to moving with speed and integrity to expand the 
list, ensuring that the process is both robust and legally 
sound.
    The UFLPA is a powerful new tool in the fight against 
forced labor and human rights abuses. While it presents 
significant challenges for businesses entangled in complex 
global supply chains, it is clearly having a profound impact on 
promoting human rights and ethical business practices, even in 
its early stage.
    As interest in global supply chains continues to grow, ILAB 
is in a unique position within the U.S. Government to improve 
working conditions and end forced labor. We will use all 
available trade enforcement tools, as well as labor diplomacy, 
multilateral engagement, and technical assistance to identify 
and raise awareness of the risks of labor exploitation world-
wide and to incentivize meaningful actions by both governments 
and private companies to prevent egregious violations of labor 
and human rights.
    Thank you, and I look forward to your questions.
    [The prepared statement of Ms. Lee follows:]
                   Prepared Statement of Thea Mei Lee
                            January 11, 2024
                              introduction
    Chairman Bishop, Ranking Member Ivey, and Members of the 
subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to testify today.
    Forced labor is all around us. It's an invisible thread in the 
fabric of global commerce, woven through the global supply chains of 
too many products and industries. Unraveling this thread requires a 
multipronged approach involving a range of stakeholders, including 
governments, businesses, labor unions, and worker organizations.
    According to the International Labor Organization's 2021 Global 
Estimates of Modern Slavery, the crime of forced labor affects nearly 
28 million people of all ages, backgrounds, and nationalities--nearly 3 
million more than in 2016. Fourteen percent of forced labor victims, or 
nearly 4 million people, are in state-imposed forced labor. Forced 
labor touches virtually all parts of the private economy--services, 
manufacturing, construction, agriculture, and mining. And forced labor 
appears in businesses of all sizes, in both the formal and informal 
sectors. The informal sector includes businesses that operate outside 
the legal and regulatory framework established by the government, such 
as day labor hired without contract; small-scale farming and fishing; 
artisanal mining and quarrying; and manufacturing work performed in 
home-based workshops.
    With over 75 years of experience working at the intersection of 
labor rights, human rights, and the global economy, the Department of 
Labor's Bureau of International Labor Affairs (ILAB) is uniquely 
positioned to guide the U.S. Government's efforts to address forced 
labor in global supply chains. ILAB works with governments, civil 
society, unions, and businesses to strengthen global labor standards, 
enforce labor commitments among trading partners, promote racial and 
gender equity, and combat international child labor, forced labor, and 
human trafficking.
    For almost 30 years, ILAB has been a leading actor in efforts to 
combat child labor and forced labor around the globe. Child labor is a 
subset of working children. It is work below the minimum age for work, 
as established in national law, and is often defined as work that 
deprives children of their childhood, their potential and their 
dignity, and that is harmful to their physical and mental development. 
The worst forms of child labor are defined as including all forms of 
slavery, including the sale or trafficking of children; debt bondage 
and serfdom; forced or compulsory labor; using, procuring or offering a 
child for prostitution, for the production of pornography or 
pornographic purposes; or for illicit activities, in particular for the 
production and trafficking of drugs, and any work that is likely to 
harm the health, safety, or morals of children. Forced labor is defined 
by ILO Convention 29 as all work or service exacted from any person 
under the menace of any penalty and for which the said person has not 
offered themselves voluntarily.
    To increase the capacity of governments and other stakeholders to 
combat forced labor and child labor and support robust strategies for 
improving compliance with international labor standards in global 
supply chains, ILAB's Office of Child Labor, Forced Labor, and Human 
Trafficking funds 49 active projects in 45 countries worth over $286 
million. In total, our programs and partnerships have built the 
capacity of over 85 countries to address labor exploitation and have 
helped countries develop and implement over 400 specific policies, 
plans, and programs to combat child labor and forced labor.
    Within the U.S. Government, ILAB is the leading provider of in-
depth research on global labor abuses. Our reporting brings attention 
to problems and incentivizes governments to address them. Our work with 
companies and trade associations advances social compliance and supply 
chain transparency. Our capacity-building projects and engagement with 
governments help countries pass and enforce labor laws that protect 
children and adults from exploitation, including safeguarding 
collective bargaining and strengthening worker rights. Our holistic 
approach allows us to effectively address forced labor from multiple 
perspectives.
  pioneering research: informing efforts to eradicate child labor and 
                              forced labor
    ILAB's 3 flagship reports on international child labor and forced 
labor serve as valuable resources for research, advocacy, Government 
action, and corporate responsibility. First, the annual Findings on the 
Worst Forms of Child Labor report (TDA Report), mandated by the Trade 
and Development Act of 2000, was first released in 2002. It assesses 
the efforts of 131 U.S. trade beneficiary countries and territories to 
eliminate child labor through legislation, enforcement mechanisms, 
policies, and social programs. In our latest edition, released in 
September 2023, just 4 countries (Argentina, Colombia, Cote d'Ivoire, 
and Uzbekistan) received the highest assessment toward the elimination 
of the worst forms of child labor, down from 9 countries the previous 
year.
    The findings also reveal that weak legal frameworks world-wide 
allow the worst forms of labor exploitation to persist. To that end, 63 
percent of the country-specific recommendations in the report focus on 
improving laws and strengthening enforcement, indicating the urgent 
need for additional progress in holding accountable those who 
perpetrate abuses.
    Second, mandated by the Trafficking Victims Protection 
Reauthorization Act (TVPRA) and first published in 2009, the biennial 
List of Goods Produced by Child Labor or Forced Labor (TVPRA List) is a 
sobering reminder of how labor exploitation infiltrates our daily lives 
through the coffee we sip, the produce we eat, and the garments we 
wear.
    The current TVPRA List includes 159 goods from 78 countries and 
areas. In the latest edition, published in September 2022, we added 32 
goods, including, for the first time, 10 downstream goods produced with 
inputs made with forced labor or child labor. These include solar cells 
and modules from China made with polysilicon that have been identified 
as being made with adult forced labor from the Xinjiang Uyghur 
Autonomous Region (Xinjiang), and lithium-ion batteries from China made 
with cobalt ore that was mined with child labor from the Democratic 
Republic of the Congo. These additions were a result of our expanded 
mandate under the Frederick Douglass Trafficking Victims Prevention and 
Protection Reauthorization Act of 2018 (TVPRA of 2018), which requires 
ILAB to report on goods made with inputs made with forced labor and 
reflects the Government's commitment to addressing the worst forms of 
labor exploitation in global supply chains.
    Finally, the List of Products Produced by Forced or Indentured 
Child Labor (EO List), required under Executive Order 13126, is 
intended to ensure that U.S. Federal agencies do not procure goods made 
by forced or indentured child labor. Under procurement regulations, 
Federal contractors who supply products on the EO List must certify 
that they have made a good-faith effort to determine whether forced or 
indentured child labor was used to produce the items supplied. 
Currently, this EO List includes 34 products (ranging from cocoa to 
garments to electronics) from 26 countries.
                   safeguarding global supply chains
    ILAB's supply chain research represents one of the first 
comprehensive efforts to identify goods produced with inputs made with 
forced labor or child labor and further aligns our work with U.S. 
enforcement mechanisms in looking at goods made wholly or in part with 
forced labor. We see our downstream supply chain research as a critical 
step forward in the growing global consensus on the importance of clean 
and transparent supply chains and the role that everyone--including 
governments, companies, investors, unions, civil society, and 
consumers--needs to play to make sure products sold here in the United 
States, and globally, are not tainted with forced labor. Our research 
is a vital resource for advocacy organizations and companies carrying 
out risk assessments and engaging in due diligence on labor rights in 
their supply chains and for consumers looking to make ethical choices.
    To date, ILAB has completed extensive studies on lithium-ion 
batteries, solar panels, and palm fruit. For the past year, ILAB has 
also looked at global supply chains in over 30 countries to identify 
goods that have inputs made with child labor or forced labor or carry a 
significant risk of labor abuse and exploitation in the supply chain. 
The sectors cover mining (including critical minerals), agriculture, 
seafood, and garments. The research will be published in September 
2024, along with ILAB's updated TVPRA List, with the aim of raising 
awareness of the global scope of goods made with child labor or forced 
labor and catalyzing governments to protect workers, businesses to 
ensure their entire supply chain is free from labor abuses, and unions, 
civil society, and consumers to hold governments and businesses 
accountable.
    We know addressing supply chain issues can be daunting for 
businesses, so we have also created tools to make it easier to 
implement or improve due diligence. The Sweat & Toil mobile app 
showcases over 1,000 pages of our research on child labor and forced 
labor in an easy-to-use and accessible format. The Better Trade Tool 
integrates existing ILAB data on international child labor and forced 
labor with U.S. and global trade data to show which global imports have 
a higher risk of being made with child labor and forced labor.
    Finally, Comply Chain is a comprehensive set of best practices for 
businesses to address child labor and forced labor across global supply 
chains. These due diligence tools are especially useful to small and 
medium-sized enterprises to strengthen compliance efforts.
    We are also using technology to innovate around supply chain 
traceability. In December 2020, ILAB funded two projects to increase 
the downstream tracing of goods made by child labor or forced labor, 
with a focus on building a blockchain-powered platform and traceability 
matrix to help users identify supply chain traceability elements, 
methods, and technologies to address labor risks in diverse supply 
chains. Our goal is to expand the number of tracing tools in high-risk 
supply chains and to get those tools into the hands of a broad range of 
stakeholders to help eliminate child labor and forced labor.
    First, the Global Trace Protocol project is in the process of 
building a blockchain-powered platform that brings all members of the 
cotton supply chain in Pakistan to a single platform, including 
farmers, spinners, and fabric mills. The project has also released 
reports on the cotton supply chain in Pakistan, the cobalt supply chain 
in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and a context analysis report 
on traceability, which includes an overview of traceability and how to 
undertake it in supply chains.
    Second, the STREAMS project, which is working in the garment supply 
chain in India, is developing a supply chain traceability matrix that 
users such as businesses, government officials, and civil society 
stakeholders can use to identify which supply chain traceability 
elements, methods, and technologies can address relevant forced labor 
and child labor risks in diverse upstream and downstream supply chains.
    Our supply chain work aims to eliminate labor abuses, including 
child labor, in international critical mineral supply chains, many of 
which are dominated by Chinese companies. For example, thousands of 
children work in informal, artisanal, and small-scale cobalt mines in 
the Democratic Republic of the Congo. That cobalt is then exported to 
China where it ends up in lithium-ion batteries. To create a cobalt 
supply chain free of labor exploitation, ILAB's technical assistance 
programs focus on building the capacity of the Democratic Republic of 
the Congo's government to enforce its labor laws, creating systems to 
identify and remediate child labor and promote traceability. For 
example, one ILAB-funded project is working with the Congolese Ministry 
of Labor to recruit and train more than 2,000 new labor inspectors and 
controllers to improve labor law enforcement, including within the 
mining sector.
    Another ILAB-funded project recently launched a Child Labor 
Monitoring and Remediation System to combat child labor in cobalt 
supply chains. Since the launch of this system in April 2023 at four 
mining sites in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, over 2,500 child 
laborers have been identified and are being assessed for services. 
Similar work is happening in other countries. Through our research, 
reporting, and technical assistance, ILAB will continue to address 
labor abuses in critical mineral supply chains world-wide.
              documenting forced labor in xinjiang, china
    For over a decade, ILAB has been highlighting the use of forced 
labor in the production of goods from China.
    ILAB included 12 goods from China on the original TVPRA List in 
2009. The latest TVPRA List includes 18 goods produced by forced labor 
in China, including several that involve the use of forced labor in 
Xinjiang, China's far western region where hundreds of thousands of 
Uyghurs, ethnic Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, and members of other persecuted groups 
are being arbitrarily detained and subjected to forced labor producing 
goods that enter the domestic and global supply chains. The Chinese 
government has given subsidies to companies moving to Xinjiang or 
employing members of persecuted groups from Xinjiang in labor transfer 
programs. These practices increase demand for workers from persecuted 
groups in Xinjiang. Uyghurs and other minorities are often sent to 
camps (referred to as Educational Training Centers or Legal Education 
Centers) where they are subjected to constant surveillance and 
isolation and undergo political indoctrination.
    Though the production of these goods through forced labor takes 
place primarily in Xinjiang, there have also been credible reports of 
mass transfers of Uyghurs and others from Xinjiang to factories across 
China. This increases the number of goods potentially made with forced 
labor. ILAB continues to monitor the developments and risks in global 
supply chains in the region.
    Last year, ILAB published two supply chain studies that documented 
exploited labor in global supply chains with production points in 
China. The first study found forced labor in the production of 
polysilicon, a key material used to produce solar panels. Xinjiang 
produces nearly half of the world's polysilicon, and its use of forced 
labor taints the entire global solar supply chain. China is also a 
major producer of photovoltaic ingots and wafers, which often 
incorporate and co-mingle polysilicon from Xinjiang with polysilicon 
from other sources. These ingots and wafers are used in the production 
of solar cells and modules. America's top 4 solar trade partners 
(Malaysia, Vietnam, Thailand, and South Korea) also import large 
quantities of solar inputs from China. As a result of this study, ILAB 
included photovoltaic ingots and wafers, solar cells, and solar modules 
in the TVPRA List, and we further highlight other downstream goods at 
risk of having forced labor inputs, such as silica-based products, 
solar generators, and semiconductors.
    The second study examined cobalt supply chains, a key input to 
lithium-ion batteries, which has been found to be mined with child 
labor in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. With enormous volumes of 
this cobalt shipped to China, electronic products around the world are 
at risk of being linked to child labor. In 2020, China imported 89.4 
percent of its cobalt from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Most 
of China's cobalt is further refined and used to produce battery 
chemicals and components, such as cathodes. China then uses these parts 
to produce rechargeable lithium-ion batteries, which are on ILAB's 
TVPRA List for having an input made with child labor. In 2020, 
countries around the world imported over 41 percent of their lithium-
ion batteries (valued at $16.5 billion) from China. Chinese-
manufactured lithium-ion batteries are found in dozens of downstream 
products that we use in our daily lives, including computers, cell 
phones, vacuum cleaners, electric vehicles, and hearing aids.
          interagency coordination on forced labor enforcement
    As an active and critical member of the Forced Labor Enforcement 
Task Force (FLETF), ILAB is committed to contributing and leveraging 
our research, reporting, and tools to support our partner U.S. 
Government agencies to take enforcement actions that ensure global 
supply chains are free of human rights abuses.
    The Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA), which directs the 
FLETF to develop a strategy for supporting enforcement of the 
prohibition on the importation of goods into the United States 
manufactured wholly or in part with forced labor in Xinjiang and other 
parts of China, is an essential component of the trade enforcement 
strategy to address forced labor. The global demand for cheap labor, 
including the use of state-sponsored forced labor, makes workers 
vulnerable in every part of our global economy. ILAB is committed to 
using our research and all of the tools at our disposal to meaningfully 
address labor rights violations and abuses, advance efforts to combat 
forced labor, and improve transparency and accountability throughout 
global supply chains.
    The UFLPA provided the U.S. Government with powerful new tools to 
combat forced labor, which align with the Biden-Harris administration's 
efforts to eradicate forced labor from U.S. supply chains. We take 
seriously the mandate from Congress to enforce these provisions and to 
prevent American consumers from inadvertently purchasing goods made 
with forced labor. The intent of the law is clear: the onus is on 
importers to demonstrate they are not in violation of the UFLPA. The 
United States has zero tolerance for businesses profiting from genocide 
and crimes against humanity.
    Since the UFLPA passed in December 2021, ILAB and the FLETF have 
prioritized implementing certain UFLPA mandates. ILAB served as co-lead 
in drafting substantial portions of the UFLPA Strategy, released in 
June 2022, including the comprehensive risk assessment and evaluation 
of forced labor schemes, as well as the guidance to importers. The 
FLETF drew on ILAB's expertise from Comply Chain, which has guided U.S. 
Government due diligence for 10 years and created a standard set of 
practices to reduce the likelihood of goods being produced by labor 
exploitation, including forced labor. We also heard of the significance 
of the UFLPA to the Uyghur American community and the broader Uyghur 
diaspora. Addressing forced labor in Xinjiang through the full 
implementation and enforcement of the UFLPA is of critical importance 
to preventing goods made with forced labor of Uyghurs and members of 
persecuted groups from entering the United States.
    Upon the release of the UFLPA Strategy, the FLETF established an 
internal subcommittee dedicated to developing recommendations for 
adding entities to the UFLPA Entity List. ILAB serves as co-chair, 
developing a methodology and process for FLETF member agencies to 
consider in reviewing entity referrals, as well as guidance for 
interpretation of UFLPA Entity List criteria for supporting information 
and evidence required for addition. We draw from existing procedural 
guidelines to ensure the review and evaluation of information considers 
relevant factors, such as source of information, including credibility 
and reliability.
    ILAB prioritizes the addition of entities that are violating the 
law to the UFLPA Entity List. We are committed to ensuring this process 
is robust and legally sound. Our teams have applied dynamic and 
evolving solutions to new and different pressure points as they arise. 
We also acknowledge there are limitations to these efforts, including 
the lack of available and current information on forced labor, 
especially in China and particularly in Xinjiang. Forced labor is 
challenging to identify because many of the indicators are hidden, and 
it often happens in legitimate business supply chains. We need to 
support organizations, including academics, journalists, civil society, 
and labor groups, who are advocating on behalf of vulnerable workers 
and risking their lives to make information public.
    Our work on the FLETF, implementing the UFLPA, and our mandated 
reporting reflect ILAB's commitment to addressing forced labor in 
global supply chains and increasing supply chain transparency and 
accountability. These expanded forced labor enforcement tools and 
mechanisms have also enabled increased engagement with like-minded 
partners around the world. Counterparts in Canada, Mexico, the European 
Union, the United Kingdom, Germany, Australia, and others have sought 
out our expertise in research and reporting on identifying and 
addressing labor exploitation, in particular forced labor risks, in 
global supply chains. These measures have provided opportunities to 
leverage our work globally.
                               conclusion
    As attention and interest in global supply chains continue to grow, 
ILAB is in a unique position within the U.S. Government to improve 
working conditions and end forced labor in these supply chains. We are 
also leveling the playing field for responsible businesses. ILAB will 
continue to work with our U.S. interagency partners in a whole-of-
Government effort to ensure that there are economic consequences for 
those who continue to break laws and profit from labor abuses.
    ILAB is committed to ensuring that we use our trade enforcement 
tools, as well as labor diplomacy, multilateral engagement, and 
technical assistance, to identify and raise awareness of the risks of 
labor exploitation in countries and supply chains world-wide.
    The UFLPA is a landmark law in the fight against forced labor and 
human rights abuses. While it presents significant challenges for 
businesses entangled in complex global supply chains, its broader 
impact on promoting human rights and ethical business practices is 
undeniable. We must continue to implement the UFLPA to its fullest 
extent.
    Thank you, and I look forward to your questions.

    Chairman Bishop. Thank you, Ms. Lee.
    Members will be recognized by order of seniority for their 
5 minutes of questioning. An additional round of questioning 
may be called after all Members have been recognized. I now 
recognize myself for 5 minutes of questioning.
    I will say at the inception, I think, as I have learned 
more about this issue and I listened, actually, to Ranking 
Member Ivey's comments last hearing and his opening statement 
today, what seems to elude me is, you know, you got the Uyghur 
Forced Labor Protection Act, which is new. You all have made 
the point very well that we have got almost 100 years of 
experience attempting to control products from forced labor 
entering the United States. I don't really discern that much, 
really, in your statement so far, or in the report that I read 
on this on UFLPA in particular, how big the problem is, any 
kind of metric to indicate what, you know, the size of the 
problem we confront and how effective we are interdicting the 
problem.
    There are some indications, like I have heard from textile 
industry questions about how broadly and actively we are 
applying isotopic testing to indicate maybe we are not doing 
enough. The number of entities on the list seems awfully small. 
That is what I think Mr. Ivey was saying.
    So let me begin with Ms. Brzozowski and say, how does DHS 
assess the effectiveness of the efforts in slowing down the 
flow of goods made with forced labor in China entering the 
United States and more broadly?
    Ms. Brzozowski. Thank you for the question, and you're 
right out of the gate with a very good one.
    This is something that, as I came on board recently and 
took over the position I'm now in, I asked my team, how are we 
measuring? How are we inspecting our progress? How do we know 
that we're doing all that we can do? We say that we're 
committed and we want to be making a dent in this.
    I'll have to say that the size and extent of the challenge 
I think has been well-documented. We know what we're up 
against. Our ability to add entities to the list, I think we 
do--we are absolutely committed, we agree 100 percent that we 
need to scale that. Enactment, work since enactment has really 
been focused on setting up a robust and methodologically-sound 
process. But I am confident that we're now at the point where 
we can really start to grind those wheels and move forward much 
quicker.
    As to how we are actually--what metrics we're using and how 
we're measuring success, right now it is a bit anecdotally what 
we're hearing from companies, the types of seizures we're 
seeing. We do have confidence that industry is hearing, getting 
the message, shifting supply chains, looking at their sources 
of where they're getting products.
    We also have money that was allocated by Congress to our 
science and technology division to do some of that assessment. 
We're appreciative of those funds to be able to give us some of 
those metrics going forward.
    Chairman Bishop. Thank you, ma'am.
    Same sort of question to you, Mr. Choy, at CBP. Speak, if 
you can, to how rapidly you are implementing isotope testing, 
just because I have heard of that a good bit. Also, how do you 
measure success in enforcement? Does this amount to sort-of a 
posturing of the U.S. Government is not really getting the job, 
you know, that sort-of shows our values? Or are we actually 
making a tremendous dent and clamping down on this in a way 
that is, you know, notable within the supply chain?
    Mr. Choy. Thank you, Chairman Bishop, for that question.
    I'll start off with addressing kind-of the authorities with 
regards to the agencies in our Nation's forced labor 
enforcement laws. This goes back to, as mentioned earlier, to 
the Tariff Act in 1930, which did create the prohibition of 
goods produced with forced labor, prison labor, or the worst 
forms of child labor. But, however, there was a consumptive 
demand clause within the Tariff Act that said that if the 
country didn't produce goods in enough quantity that satiated 
the domestic demand, then it was still OK. Right? So it wasn't 
until 2016, through the Trade Facilitation, Trade Enforcement 
Act, that repealed the consumptive demand clause out of the 
Tariff Act.
    So we've really been kind-of gone full bore since 2016 to 
ramp up the agency's program, but also to supplement a lot of 
the efforts that were already on-going within the U.S. 
Government, like the Department of Labor's effort as well as 
departments----
    Chairman Bishop. That is helpful. Address specifically, if 
you will, isotopic testing and the degree to which it has been 
implemented.
    Mr. Choy. Yes, sir. So, we have definitely been going out 
in the sense that we have tested the technology and, in fact, 
using the Congress--the resources that Congress did provide for 
us, we did acquire this past year capabilities in isotopic 
testing. So we have--our first lab just stood up in Savannah, 
Georgia.
    Chairman Bishop. Good to know.
    Mr. Choy. Just this past quarter. We expect the other two 
labs in New York City and Los Angeles to also stand up here 
within the next 6 to 8 months as well. The equipment was 
acquired back in fiscal year 2022 and is now getting delivered 
and installed, and we've got staff and scientists that we 
brought on board as well to do that. So that'll increase our 
capacity.
    We anticipate we'll be doing more isotopic testing. We 
leverage that isotopic testing to investigate where we see 
allegations of risk or use of forced labor or in this case, 
say, what the XUAR and cotton--where the cotton may be used in 
the supply chain.
    Chairman Bishop. That is encouraging to hear. I have got a 
lot of other great questions, but, unfortunately, my time has 
expired, so I will recognize Ranking Member Ivey for his 5 
minutes of questioning.
    Mr. Ivey. Well, I appreciate that, Mr. Chairman.
    Just sort-of along the lines on the isotopic testing, since 
we are on that, so my understanding is that that is primarily 
for textiles.
    Mr. Choy. Yes, Ranking Member, I appreciate that question.
    Yes. Right now, that is currently the capability that is 
principally used and proven for textiles. I know that industry 
is exploring that. I think there's also national labs that are 
looking at that capability to expand, potentially, to see where 
it could also be leveraged in other types of commodities. But 
right now, it's principally in textiles.
    Mr. Ivey. OK. By the way, the textiles industry was here 
and was very eager to get an expansion of the isotopic testing 
and said that they would be happy to lobby on your behalf for 
additional resources to expand that out. I am certainly open to 
that as well.
    But I did have this question. So with respect to back to 
the African minerals issue, and my understanding is that a lot 
of the minerals are mined in Africa, but maybe not solely, 
using forced labor and child labor; that they are then sent, in 
many instances, to China, and then whatever steps are taken 
there to integrate those materials into the final product; and 
then they get shipped either directly or through other, you 
know, other countries to the United States.
    How are we able--is there an equivalent to isotopic testing 
for minerals? Or, I mean, and if not, how are you able to 
figure out--how are we as a Nation able to figure out that 
these materials are coming to us via forced labor or child 
labor?
    Mr. Choy. Thank you, Ranking Member Ivy, for that question.
    Certainly, currently, to my understanding, and I can 
certainly take it back as well, is that for extractives, there 
isn't really a scientific capability to--which includes the 
minerals and things like gold and whatnot, to be able to 
leverage scientific testing to determine the origin. So, 
basically, what we use and rely upon is in our surveillance and 
our analysis of supply chains, as well as doing deep in-depth 
supply chain reviews with importations we suspect that leverage 
sources of forced labor.
    Mr. Ivey. Ms. Lee? Yes.
    Ms. Lee. I didn't want to interrupt you, sir.
    Thank you, Ranking Member Ivey.
    I wanted to weigh in on this question because this is 
something that the Department of Labor ILAB has also focused 
our technical assistance resources on. We have funded a 
technical assistance project in the Democratic Republic of the 
Congo that can begin to trace the cobalt from its origin in the 
artisanal and small mines all the way through to its end use. 
Much of it ends up in lithium ion batteries, which are, in 
fact, manufactured in China. As we know, China owns maybe 70 
percent of the cobalt mines in the Democratic Republic of the 
Congo, and then does process most of that cobalt into lithium 
ion batteries that end up in our supply chain.
    But so we have a new project that is starting with the 
artisanal mines, and that is going to follow the cobalt to 
every stage of its subsequent production.
    Mr. Ivey. I might, since we are just time-constrained, you 
know, you might have to, if you could, send me some sort of 
written explanation about the details on that, and if you need 
additional resources to build that out, that would be good to 
know.
    But back to you, Secretary Choy. I mean, I think you 
mentioned something about the mineral detection, I think you 
said gold. Now, is that--I think from Ms. Lee's perspective, if 
she is talking about just tracing it through the supply chain, 
if I am hearing you correctly, is there a scientific test for 
the actual minerals themselves, Mr. Choy, that you were 
referencing or is that something different? If that is the 
case, does that mean you have to dismantle whatever the product 
is to get the material to test?
    Mr. Choy. Ranking Member Ivey, so there is not a scientific 
capability to test the origin. What I was referring to was 
similar to what Deputy----
    Mr. Ivey. Oh.
    Mr. Choy [continuing]. Secretary Lee was saying, was that 
we rely upon that supply chain tracing, understand who the 
entities are at risk, and then following it through the entire 
supply chain to the actual us importation.
    Mr. Ivey. OK. Then, boy, time runs short, doesn't it? I did 
have the question about the addition of entities to the list. 
You said something, I guess the list was established in June.
    Well, I think I heard from Ms. Brzozowski, was that June 
2022 that you mentioned, that 2 have been added since then?
    Ms. Brzozowski. Sorry, the initial inaugural list included 
20 entities, and since then, so since 2022, we've added an 
additional 10.
    Mr. Ivey. Ten. OK. All right. Then you mentioned that there 
have been more resources--I am running over.
    Well, I will yield back, but perhaps we could have a next 
round, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Bishop. Thank you, Mr. Ranking Member. The 
gentlemen yields back.
    I now recognize Mr. Ezell for 5 minutes of questioning.
    Mr. Ezell. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Mr. Ivey, if I don't use my time, you are welcome to take 
some of my time. This is so important. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    You know, as we uncovered in our previous hearing, the 
Chinese Communist Party is using the Uyghur slave market to 
process seafood caught around the world. This product, of 
course, is making it to the American markets using slave labor. 
The CCP, who do not care about people, let's just make that--we 
know that, they are using their product to sell at artificially 
low prices. This creates clear disadvantages for shrimpers and 
fishermen along the Mississippi Gulf Coast, which is my 
district. It is very concerning, as the fishermen and shrimpers 
have contacted me numerous times about this.
    Ms. Lee, as a member of the Forced Labor Enforcement Task 
Force, we know that seafood that is produced by slave labor is 
still reaching the American market. Doesn't this suggest the 
Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act is not being enforced 
properly?
    Ms. Lee. Thank you so much, Congressman, for that question.
    The allegations of forced labor use in the processing and 
also on the fishing of seafood are very, very serious, and we 
take them very seriously. I think the Forced Labor Enforcement 
Task Force is looking into whether we should be adding seafood 
as one of the priority sectors when we update the enforcement 
strategy.
    I have the privilege of sitting on the Congressional-
Executive Commission on China, and we heard some very alarming 
testimony from Mr. Ian Urbina, Professor Robert Stumberg from 
Georgetown University, with respect to this. We are looking 
into all of the allegations. We are also looking into what 
tools we have at our disposal to address the allegations of 
forced labor and the allegations that Uyghur workers are being 
used to process some of the seafood that ends up back in the 
United States.
    Mr. Ezell. Thank you very much. You know, I strongly 
believe that the seafood should be identified, you know, as a 
high priority here under the UFLPA. Do you agree with that? If 
approved, you know, how quickly could we identify so this could 
be, you know, officially recognized?
    Ms. Lee. The Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force is looking 
into that right now. But even before we formally identify 
seafood as a priority area, there is nothing that stops our 
colleagues in CBP and DHS from looking into shipments or 
companies that might be suspicious. I think that is something 
that we see as a very high priority indeed. So I share your 
sense of urgency, sir.
    Mr. Ezell. Thank you. What are some of the factors that you 
would consider before adding a new entity to the list? Mr. 
Choy? Anybody?
    Ms. Brzozowski. Yes, actually, I probably am better able to 
take that.
    We don't get into this, sharing some of the specific 
criteria, but what we are going to look at in general are the 
allegations that we are--or recommendations that we're 
receiving from member agencies, importantly from the 
nongovernmental organizations that are really closest to the 
ground in monitoring and doing research on these entities. They 
provide some vital inputs.
    We are looking at, of course, the supply chain mapping and 
other types of research that could give us an indication of the 
providence of either the good or the corporate structure of the 
entities involved.
    Mr. Ezell. Thank you. Mr. Choy, Gulf Coast shrimpers 
advocated for the elimination of the consumptive demand 
loophole in section 307. Since this loophole was repealed, I 
would expect robust enforcement of the prohibition of imports 
of goods produced by forced labor. However, CBP did not issue 
any withhold release orders in 2023, and CBP has not taken any 
additional action regarding seafood since January 2022. Can you 
talk to me about this, please?
    Mr. Choy. Thank you, Congressman Ezell, for that question.
    CBP does take the allegations in the seafood and seafood 
industry very seriously. We have enforced robustly by issuing 
withhold release orders against fishing vessels and also a 
fleet of Chinese vessels as well. Certainly, I think with the 
implementation of the UFLPA has had an impact with regards to 
our ability to continue or push more rapidly investigations of 
the allegations that we have received.
    So, but we are right now working robustly where we've 
increased staffing to look at the allegations that have come 
in, and we are looking at the allegations received in the 
seafood industry. We have been in close contact with Ian Urbina 
from the Outlaw Ocean Project, as well as other stakeholders 
that were involved in that. We have the information that they 
have, and we're looking into those allegations. Where we find 
kind-of the violations of the law and violations under 307, we 
will--you have a commitment, we will enforce.
    Mr. Ezell. You will do that?
    Mr. Choy. Yes, sir.
    Mr. Ezell. Yes. You know, I get--you know, growing up there 
on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, just about every Saturday during 
shrimp season, you can go down on the docks and get fresh 
shrimp. But our shrimpers are just being put out of business. I 
mean, for generations, they have been doing this stuff, and, 
you know, we need to stop that. These people are hard working 
and have done this their whole lives, and I need your help. So 
I want your commitment from all of you that you will do 
everything you can within your power to help us get this back 
on track.
    So thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
    Chairman Bishop. The gentlemen yields back.
    The subcommittee has its own expert on isotope testing, and 
he is sitting on my left. That is Mr. Thanedar, and I recognize 
him for 5 minutes of questioning.
    Mr. Thanedar. Thank you, Chairman Bishop. Thank you for 
holding this hearing and certainly welcome the expertise of our 
witnesses.
    Just, Mr. Choy, we have spoken a lot today about what the 
Government can be doing to stop forced labor goods from 
entering the country. However, at the end of the day, private 
companies, including importers and retailers, are the ones 
responsible for following the U.S. laws.
    A few questions. How can companies help ensure that their 
supply chain are free of forced labor? How has CBP engaged with 
private sector to educate them on their responsibilities?
    Mr. Choy. Congressman Thanedar, thank you for that 
question.
    CBP has engaged very robustly with industry. Together with 
the Department, we have engaged--have well over 500 engagements 
with industry, with stakeholders, international stakeholders, 
with civil society, and with our partners across the 
Government, principally to highlight, especially when we engage 
with industry, the responsibility that you mentioned, that 
industry has to maintain good due diligence within their supply 
chains.
    With regards to the effects that Assistant Secretary 
Brzozowski had mentioned is that we have seen effects where 
industry has been leveraging the tools and technologies that we 
brought folks in last March during our tech expo to introduce 
some of the tools and technologies and solutions that private 
industry has been creating to help industry do due diligence in 
this space. We've seen that industry has taken a very proactive 
stance in bringing on these capabilities to help them get 
better visibility into supply chains beyond tier 2, to also 
leverage isotopic testing at certain points within the supply 
chain. If you look at textiles, we've seen industry leverage 
testing capabilities, whether it's at the spinning, where the 
raw materials come in, or at certain parts maybe where the 
textiles themselves are made, or further where the garments are 
made.
    So at certain checkpoints, the isotopic testing or 
scientific testing capabilities are a tool in the kitbag that 
industry can use to help them exercise due diligence in their 
supply chains.
    Mr. Thanedar. What can we in Congress do? How can we 
support CBP in this investment?
    Mr. Choy. Well, certainly we're very appreciative of the 
investment that Congress has already made with the agency. What 
we're looking for as far as prioritizing our resources from now 
and forward is being able to use those resources smartly, 
right, and take those resources and make our work force more 
efficient.
    So we appreciate the continued support from Congress in the 
sense that we will integrate the capabilities that we brought 
on board to look at our--to integrate into our more broad kind-
of enforcement platforms, like our advanced trade analytics 
platform, which brings in a significant amount of data, 
Government data, public and open-source data, to help us 
identify risks within the supply chain.
    We're also looking at opportunities to enhance our 
advanced--our automated commercial environment, which all trade 
transactions occur, which needs to be modernized. We have 
efforts under way to modernize that to keep pace with the 
advancements that industry has made and in global trade 
overall, and to help us to continue to force.
    Just last, I just wanted to highlight that with the 
investments, I mean, we did invest significantly in additional 
staffing, both officers and nonuniform staff within CBP. 
Certainly we continue to focus on that professional development 
for our nonuniform staff, especially for basic entry and 
advanced training for them, focusing in on things like learning 
supply chain, doing supply chain reviews, gathering 
intelligence, those types of capabilities that we really need 
to cultivate within our nonuniform capability within the 
agency.
    Mr. Thanedar. Well, I certainly thank the hard-working 
women and men of the CBP, and thank you for your testimony 
today.
    Mr. Chair, I am out of time.
    Chairman Bishop. The gentleman yields back.
    I now recognize Mr. Strong for 5 minutes of questioning.
    Mr. Strong. Thank you, Mr. Chairman Bishop, Ranking Member 
Ivey.
    It is a lot more pleasant today in this hearing room than 
it was yesterday----
    Mr. Ivey. Yes, it is.
    Mr. Strong [continuing]. But I can promise you we have got 
a commonality here that both sides of the aisle understands 
what is at risk.
    Ms. Brzozowski and Mr. Choy, at a previous hearing, our 
witnesses discussed the impact of de minimis shipments, Uyghur 
Forced Labor Prevention Act enforcement. According to these 
witnesses, the rapid increase in de minimis packages, 
particularly from China, undermines the ability of CBP to 
detect forced labor products or contraband.
    How concerned are you that the Chinese companies could take 
advantage of de minimis to ship goods potentially made with 
forced labor to the United States?
    Ms. Brzozowski. Maybe I'll start briefly, but can say that 
I share your concern with this challenge. As my colleague from 
CBP had mentioned, there is a difference in data that we get 
for these types of shipments, and that can complicate 
enforcement. Also, given the volume of these shipments, it's a 
complex environment what we're doing to it. But I do want to 
make clear that the targeting and the laws do apply in this 
environment, and we do our best with the information that we do 
have.
    We have a--in the short term, we are looking to enhance 
that targeting to do better, using software and other different 
technical capabilities. In the medium term, we are looking to 
enhance the data that we do get through regulatory action. Over 
the longer term, we would be open to a conversation with 
Congress.
    Mr. Strong. Thank you. How much visibility do we have 
regarding the scale of potential UFLPA violations related to 
the diminishment shipments?
    Mr. Choy. So, Congressman, I appreciate that question, and 
certainly I echo Assistant Secretary Brzozowski's comments in 
the sense that we recognize the challenge and issues in a de 
minimis environment. Certainly, when we look at the challenges 
within a de minimis environment, a lot of it goes back to the 
lack of information that we gather as compared to traditional 
shipments that come in through our ports of entry.
    So with that, I mean, we have, since 2019, initiated two 
programs. One is we created a new entry type, which we call the 
entry type 86. It was kind of a pilot program for folks to 
enter de minimis shipments in through a formal process. We also 
had a section 321 data pilot, which we were looking to look 
into the environment to see what additional information 
elements that would be helpful for us to understand who are the 
parties within the shipment, what's inside the box, and who the 
customers are.
    So we've come to the culmination of both of those data 
pilots. That's where we're working together with the Department 
in a regulatory effort to introduce different ways to file 
entries for de minimis shipments and then also what data 
elements that we would require for de minimis shipments. We 
feel that with that kind of expanded information and data for 
each of the shipments that comes in would give us greater 
flexibility and greater access for our targeting systems to be 
able to identify risk factors and be able to stop specific 
shipments coming in at our ports of entry.
    Mr. Strong. Thank you. A significant percentage of the U.S. 
textiles and apparel imports come from Central and South 
America, countries with whom we have free trade agreements. I 
can think back just a matter of years ago, Alabama was home to 
Russell Athletics, Champion Apparel, and we were known in one 
area of Alabama as the sock capital of the world. But that has 
gone away.
    These agreements require firms to show that the goods they 
are shipping to the United States were produced in the region 
to qualify for duty-free status. What actions has DHS and CBP 
taken to determine whether this system is being abused to allow 
goods made with Uyghur forced labor to enter the United States?
    Mr. Choy. Thank you again for that question, Congressman 
Strong.
    So we do definitely see that as a focus area for us. I 
mean, textiles is a priority trade initiative which was 
codified in the Trade Facilitation Trade Enforcement Act, which 
also means that as a priority trade initiative, it also 
prioritizes where we focus our resources in.
    So with that, we've had consistent and continued focus 
within the textile area and we focus our resources means that 
we identify, you know, targeting candidates. We do audits. We 
do foreign verification visits, verification visits here. We 
also identify--do cargo inspections, both at entry and also at 
post release, to identify where misdescriptions of the actual 
shipments may be.
    Mr. Strong. Thank you, Mr. Choy. I want to try to get one 
more real quick here. What actions does CDP take if it detects 
specific products made with forced labor being diverted to 
third-party countries? What actions do you take?
    Mr. Choy. So if there's illegal transshipment that's 
occurring through third countries, that is something that we 
would stop. We would detain those shipments. We would--then we 
would issue duty requirements to make the Government whole. 
Then we would issue--or we could potentially, if there's 
recidivism or it continues, repeat offenders, we would issue 
penalties against those.
    Mr. Strong. Thank you. I thank each of you for being here 
today.
    Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
    Chairman Bishop. The gentleman yields back.
    At the Chair's discretion, we will proceed to a second 
round of questions.
    Let me go back to, so, Mr. Choy, some of that was very 
interesting because you addressed a number of things. You know, 
the robustness of your answer was very helpful, I thought.
    Ms. Brzozowski, let me go back to you and maybe Ms. Lee, 
also, if I can work it in about the UFLPA Entity List or--yes, 
I think that is the right way to refer to it. So if what I 
understood is about 85 percent of China's, you know, cotton 
produce or cotton products produce is sourced from Xinjiang, 
which is the region where the forced labor issue is most 
pronounced, and just thinking about the size of the Chinese 
economy and general knowledge or general perception about the 
amount of commerce in those goods to the United States, I am 
always--you know, we don't have the expertise maybe to gauge 
everything that you guys are doing, but we can certainly hear 
when what you are saying sounds like it is really--you know, 
you are getting after it, and we want to hear that, obviously. 
When I hear the size of the list in contrast to those facts, it 
just seems striking.
    Ms. Lee, before I ask, Ms. Brzozowski, you mentioned the 
TVPRA list, so I guess that is--you have got some sort of a 
list. Sort-of like, you know, I hear about these lists of 
Treasury designating lists of foreign bad actors and so forth. 
So I understand all these things exist in law. How many 
entities or people on the TVPRA list? Any idea?
    Ms. Lee. Sure. They're not entities. There aren't specific 
companies on the TVPRA list.
    Chairman Bishop. I see.
    Ms. Lee. What we identify is a product and a country. So, 
for example, cobalt from the Democratic Republic of Congo.
    Chairman Bishop. I see.
    Ms. Lee. It's really what our list is meant to be is sort-
of a starting point, and I think it is a resource that CBP and 
DHS would use to say, oh, there might be a problem with, for 
example, cobalt.
    Chairman Bishop. So maybe--and that is helpful. My question 
is probably not that very apt, though, because I don't know 
there is any comparison to be drawn here or anything.
    But, Ms. Brzozowski, just back to you. You talked about 
your team. You got a bunch of things in the works. When you 
guys come back, maybe I won't still be here, but at the end of 
this year or shortly thereafter, we will hear about a lot of 
additional entities added to the list. But I would like you 
speak to that a little bit more.
    What is flawed about my perception of what I just 
suggested? China is a massive economic actor, big market, 85 
percent was the figure that I heard of their products are 
sourced to Xinjiang. So why so few people even on the initial 
list? Why wasn't it hundreds or thousands of entities?
    Ms. Brzozowski. Thank you for your question.
    Again, I find myself in the good position of being able to 
agree with you on the ultimate goal of wanting to get this list 
up and expanded. I think that the team has done very impressive 
work since the relatively short time of the enactment of the 
law, setting up not only frameworks, but a robust methodology 
that is going to stand not only the test of time, but legal 
scrutiny.
    So we were pulling together from a broad array of expertise 
across agencies of administrative processes and managing and 
running and creating other types of Entity Lists. So that is 
where we were able to leverage the expertise and the resources 
and the know-how of the broad array of the task force members.
    But you're right that the numbers themselves might not 
reflect the totality of that work.
    Chairman Bishop. You talk about legally sound. Is this 
something that, like, companies that are listed litigate 
against the United States Government?
    Ms. Brzozowski. Yes, sir.
    Chairman Bishop. OK. So, Mr. Choy, Mr. Ivey made reference 
to this issue. What happens when CBP stops its shipment and 
determines it shouldn't be admitted into the United States? Is 
it released back to the shipper, or is it seized?
    Mr. Choy. Thank you for that question, Chairman Bishop.
    So when the shipment is stopped or when it comes in, and 
we've identified this as potentially something that could be 
stopped pursuant to the UFLPA, there's two somewhat scenarios 
in this. The one that, where we have clear, say, direct 
shipments, say, from the XUAR, where we know specifically that 
this shipment is attributed back to a Xinjiang manufacturer or 
producer or an entity that's identified on the Entity List, 
those shipments are excluded, meaning that they are denied 
entry into the U.S. commerce. So the importer does have the 
ability to reexport that shipment.
    But then also where we have shipments, where we feel that 
we know that there's ties within the supply chain not 
necessarily produced in the Xinjiang region of China, where 
it's, say, manufactured further downstream with inputs from the 
Xinjiang region of China, those shipments are detained. Then we 
work together with the importer where they have the ability to 
submit matters on behalf of those entries to demonstrate 
whether the UFLPA does or doesn't apply to those specific 
shipments. In that case, we request a full supply chain 
documentation from the raw materials to all inputs to the 
actual importation of the goods.
    Chairman Bishop. My time has expired, so I yield to Mr.--or 
recognize Mr. Ivey for his 5 minutes in the second round.
    Mr. Ivey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    I want to follow up on that question and, actually, a 
question earlier with respect to perishables, in that instance, 
seafood. So you identify a shipment that is in violation, I 
guess. By the way, the description of the process you just 
outlined, is that only for textiles or would that apply for 
minerals or seafood as well?
    Mr. Choy. That applies across the board.
    Mr. Ivey. All right. OK. So you detain it, you mentioned. 
How fast is that process? Because if you got perishables, I 
would assume it would have to move very, very quickly for you 
to run your traps and make a determination about whether there 
is a violation there or not. How would that work?
    Mr. Choy. So, according to the regulations, the importer 
has 30 days to submit matters on behalf of the specific entry 
to the responding center of excellence and expertise. So it's 
really up to the importer to have their documentation ready. So 
if they don't have that documentation ready, they can go up to 
30 days. They can request an extension, but if the importer has 
their documentation ready, the centers have been able to clear 
through shipments relatively quickly within 7 to 14 days.
    Mr. Ivey. OK. So, how does that work for seafood? I mean, 
because that is a very long--especially 30 days. That is just 
too long. So, I mean, what do you do in that instance?
    Mr. Choy. Well, in that instance, I mean, it would be 
incumbent upon the importer to make a decision of whether they 
would either reexport those shipments or figure out ways to 
store and maintain those shipments.
    Mr. Ivey. When you say reexport, you mean send it to 
someplace other than the United States?
    Mr. Choy. That's correct. Yes, sir.
    Mr. Ivey. All right. So then the importer, whether it is 
seafood or minerals or textiles, still would have the 
opportunity to profit from the child labor or forced labor that 
we had identified?
    Mr. Choy. So, and if the importer reimports those goods, 
yes.
    Mr. Ivey. All right. Let me--have we--has Congress given 
you the legal authority to seize these imported materials, not 
just detain, but to seize them?
    Mr. Choy. So we do have the regulatory authority to seize 
those goods. It would depend based upon the case and the 
scenario by which those entries are. But also, statutorily, 
there are challenges with regards to the seizure process that 
is lengthy and with regards to the burden on the agency as 
well.
    Mr. Ivey. OK. We will set perishables to the side for the 
moment just because of the time sensitivity, obviously, with 
those. But let's say minerals with respect to the batteries or 
with respect to textiles, how is there a determination made?
    Because from my--I will just say this. My perspective is if 
we really want to put sanctions in place that punish these 
companies that are involved in the supply chain that we have 
effectively traced back to forced labor or child labor, 
allowing them to just send it to Plan B and get the same amount 
of money doesn't seem to really get the message across in the 
same way.
    I know the United States is a gigantic market and everybody 
wants to continue with that, but, you know, if they--and I 
think this is what we got from the textiles association 
testimony. If they just keep pushing the mass over and hoping 
that the vast majority of it will get through, but every now 
and then something will get caught, but it still just gets 
redirected, they just sell it somewhere else, it seems to me 
that we are not, you know, using our tools sufficiently to send 
the message back.
    This isn't a criticism of you all. I am just--you know, 
this is a question, but this is my sense of it from what I 
think I am hearing.
    So what is your take, out to the whole panel, what is your 
take on that issue?
    Ms. Brzozowski. From a--maybe not from the operational 
perspective at the border, but I could also say that this is 
why it's so absolutely imperative that we have partnerships 
with foreign governments, so that as these--if seizures are not 
able to be accommodated on each and every instance, that these 
goods are not finding their way into other countries, and that 
as a collective, we're working against the reimport of these 
violative goods.
    I'll give one more note, that as the task force, this is 
one of our primary responsibilities. So in addition to creating 
the Entities List, one of the key responsibilities is to 
actually conduct that engagement to go out to not only the 
private-sector companies for education, which is largely 
being----
    Mr. Ivey. Well, just to reclaim quickly.
    Ms. Brzozowski. Yes, please.
    Mr. Ivey. I have expired on time to reclaim, but just to 
follow up, do we have the legal authority? So you are working 
to make sure there are other countries that aren't taking it, 
but, apparently, that means that there are other countries that 
do. No offense to any, no criticism, but do we have the legal 
authority, do you have the legal authority to just say, you 
know what, forget all of that? This is an illegal shipment. We 
are using forced labor. We are going to seize it. I don't know, 
the Government, like, the Government seizes, certainly in the 
criminal world, seizes materials all the time and, you know, 
deals with it in that way.
    Do you have the authority to do that or is that something 
that Congress would have to give you?
    Mr. Choy. Thank you. The agency has the authority to seize. 
So, in the context of the UFLPA, where we have specific 
shipments, where we have the specific confidence or the exact 
confidence that we know that these are prohibited goods, we do 
have that authority to seize.
    The challenge that we have is where--and those are things 
that, as we implement things like a withhold release order or 
have entities on the Entity List or we have specific shipments, 
and we do provide notification to the importers when shipments 
are entered into the system that are going to be subject to the 
UFLPA that come directly from the Xinjiang region, so we see a 
decline in those specific shipments coming into the United 
States.
    So where the challenge being is where the inputs then are 
taken, either through third countries or those inputs are used 
in downstream manufacturing processes, and also the importer 
then has the ability to demonstrate their entire supply chain. 
So during that time, you know, we don't necessarily have the 
specific standing to seize the shipment at that point in time. 
So during any time during that process, you know, the importer 
does have the right to be able to reexport those shipments.
    Mr. Ivey. Well, I thank the Chair for--well, thank you for 
your candor with the panel, and I thank the Chair for letting 
me run over time.
    Chairman Bishop. The gentlemen yields back.
    I think it has been very helpful, and I think we will 
proceed to a discretionary third round for just a minute, you 
and I. I think Mr. Ezell doesn't care to ask, doesn't have more 
questions, so he waives.
    So let me just, again, sort-of pursue the line that you 
were on.
    No, let me take it different because there a couple of 
thoughts conflicting in my mind.
    Mr. Choy, I think you said earlier that the de minimis 
exemption or exception, whatever it is called, does not apply 
to the UFLPA. Did I get that straight?
    Mr. Choy. Chairman Bishop, the de minimis exemption does 
apply to the----
    Chairman Bishop. Does?
    Mr. Choy. Doesn't apply to the----
    Chairman Bishop. Doesn't?
    Mr. Choy. I mean----
    Chairman Bishop. It does not apply?
    Mr. Choy. There is no UFLPA exception in de minimis.
    Chairman Bishop. OK.
    Mr. Choy. For de minimis.
    Chairman Bishop. I am sorry, say that part again. There is 
no UFLPA exception?
    Mr. Choy. So there is no de minimis exception within the 
UFLPA. So the de minimis doesn't--or does apply. Or doesn't 
apply, sorry.
    Chairman Bishop. Take another shot and just explain to me 
what that means. How does that--what is the implications of 
that?
    Mr. Choy. So, meaning that in all environments where cargo 
or shipments or entries are filed, that if something is coming 
through de minimis, it's still going through all our screening 
systems.
    Chairman Bishop. OK. So like, otherwise, I mean, the basic 
notion of the de minimis exemptions, I understand it is like if 
you are getting--purchasing a certain amount, and I don't 
remember, somebody told me $800 or something like that----
    Mr. Choy. No, $800 per one--per day per person.
    Chairman Bishop. Yes. So if somebody gets some goods from 
abroad, they can kind-of bring them in and they are not subject 
to the same usual scrutiny by CBP, basically. Is that the idea?
    Mr. Choy. Well, it's not subject to duties and taxes.
    Chairman Bishop. OK. But there is no such de minimis 
exemption for anything that is covered by the UFLPA?
    Mr. Choy. Right, there isn't. So even if it comes in 
through de minimis, the UFLPA still applies.
    Chairman Bishop. Still applies.
    Mr. Choy. Right.
    Chairman Bishop. Got it. So as far as--well, let me ask 
this question, though, about the de minimis exemption. Ms. 
Brzozowski, maybe I will go to you in this part of it.
    You know, I sketched out in my opening statement some of 
the massive numbers, the massive increases in goods that come 
in with respect to the de minimis exemption. I think some 
suspect that that becomes a huge source of evasion of the 
interdiction of forced labor produced goods. Is our--and I know 
you have some background in large ecommerce platforms. To what 
degree or can you comment at all on whether e-commerce 
platforms are a driver of that massive expansion of the 
exploitation of the de minimis exemption?
    Ms. Brzozowski. In my current role what I can comment on is 
the challenge that this environment presents for our folks at 
the border for targeting, and that we have seen an exponential 
rise over the last number of years. I think there's any number 
of variety of factors that go into this, key points being we 
are working hard in a very, very challenging environment.
    These requirements, as maybe to put it in another way, we 
are enforcing on forced labor laws in this particular channel. 
But it's more challenging because of the limited amount of data 
that we get, which, of course, drives our targeting 
capabilities and our decision making.
    Chairman Bishop. All right. Mr. Choy, thank you very much 
for trying to persist through my torturous series of questions 
about the de minimis exemption. I am not sure I understand it 
fully, but I kind-of get the gist.
    Let me ask about this. You talked about three isotope 
testing labs or testing labs being stood up. One is already in 
operation. That sounds good. What kind of quantity of--can you 
quantify the amount of testing in some way that you anticipate 
those labs being able to do, the one that has been set up and 
the other two that you expect to be coming on-line and the 
difference that it will make?
    Mr. Choy. Well, I can certainly take back the 
quantification. I don't have those----
    Chairman Bishop. OK.
    Mr. Choy [continuing]. Stats in front of me currently right 
now. But I can just generally talk about with regards to how we 
leverage the isotopic testing and how we anticipate that it 
would be leveraged. I mean, certainly we've used isotopic 
testing at this point to investigate supply chains, investigate 
where we have perceived--we have received allegations and have 
perceived risk of entities and entities that are involved in 
the use of using inputs from the Xinjiang region, and that 
informs our targeting.
    But then, also, you know, we do educate and we do inform 
our folks out in the field. So this also--that education and 
training also gives the ability to our officers at our port of 
entry and our import specialists to identify shipments, pull 
samples, and then send them off for testing as well.
    Chairman Bishop. How, if at all, are the capacities of CBP 
to address this problem, how have they been affected or 
impaired by sort-of conditions at the border more generally 
that we have heard about? A lot of, you know, agents being 
moved from different regions to come to the Southwestern Border 
and service. Does that have any impact on this part of CBP's 
responsibilities?
    Mr. Choy. I would just say that, you know, the agency's, 
you know, border security mission is foremost, and then, you 
know, our focus with regards to the security within the cargo 
environment as well, is also foremost as well. You know, we 
continue to, regardless of the conditions, continue to focus on 
that and maintain that as a high priority.
    Chairman Bishop. So I take that as you keep trying to do 
your job, but, yes, there is probably an impact. Unless you are 
telling me something dramatically different, that is what I 
read in what you just shared.
    So I yield back and recognize Mr. Ivey for his final round 
of questions.
    Mr. Ivey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Just to follow up on the Chair's question about the 
testing, I was kind-of curious about the logistics of that. So 
you have got a test facility. I think you said it is in 
Georgia?
    Mr. Choy. Yes, sir. We have one in Savannah, Georgia, 
that's operational currently.
    Mr. Ivey. OK. So whatever you want to test gets shipped 
from whatever port the material is stopped at, and then you 
ship it to Georgia? Is that how it works?
    Mr. Choy. That's correct. So there's a chain of custody 
that's established, and then it's shipped to the labs to test. 
So the samples are pulled and then--but for the isotopic 
testing, there is the highlight that it does take--those 
samples are pulled, but those samples then are subsequently 
destroyed by the testing.
    Mr. Ivey. Yes. How long does it take to ship, test, and 
then make a decision? While the testing is being done, I am 
assuming nothing is being withheld or seized at that point. 
These tests are done independently of a seizure determination, 
is that right?
    Mr. Choy. It depends. So the test could be conducted when 
the shipment has already--has been detained, or they could be 
conducted when we're conducting our risk assessments and our 
surveillance of specific shipment lines.
    As far as the time it would take to go from the port to the 
lab, it's just kind-of--it would be fairly quick with regards 
to the express carriers taking those shipments. So as far as 
the time it would take to actually conduct the test, I can 
certainly take that back.
    Mr. Ivey. OK. I had a question with respect to the seize-
release issue that we were discussing a few minutes ago. 
Apparently someone decides at some point where, OK, we have 
identified this, it is a problem, but we are going to release 
it. Then there is another scenario where it gets seized. Who 
makes that determination? Is there a department or agency that 
does that, or who makes that decision?
    Mr. Choy. Thank you for that question, Ranking Member Ivey.
    So the port director has the authorities to make those 
decisions.
    Mr. Ivey. OK. You also mentioned 19 million in fraud and 
penalties, I think, at one point, that had been imposed. What 
is that on? Is that on the textiles piece or is that across the 
board?
    Mr. Choy. Those were for textiles specifically in fiscal 
year 2023. So those were for a couple of various issues, 
whether it's from valuation, misdeclaring the items, or 
declaring that--you know, claiming, you know, free trade 
agreement.
    Mr. Ivey. Have there been civil penalties imposed with 
respect to the minerals issue that we were discussing?
    Mr. Choy. I'll have to take that back, Member Ivey. I can 
certainly discuss that with your staff.
    Mr. Ivey. OK. Then I think you mentioned and I think the 
Chair referenced this as well, border security. I think 
someone, it might have been your testimony, Mr. Choy, with 
respect to fentanyl, and I was kind-of curious about that.
    Using a test to inspect supply chains, threat detection, 
and my notes have that fentanyl was mentioned in there 
somewhere, but I wasn't clear on it, so I want to get a follow-
up explanation.
    Mr. Choy. Thank you, Ranking Member Ivey, for that 
question.
    Certainly, the agency's effort in the fight against 
fentanyl has been one of the top priorities for the agency. 
Certainly the efforts behind the UFLPA and the capabilities 
that we brought on board and the capabilities we created 
through our advanced trade analytical platform to provide 
modeling of how trade flows based upon kind-of known risks and 
threats has given us the ability to look at where potential 
risks and where that fentanyl may be entering in through our 
ports of entry. So that's where I'd mentioned fentanyl within 
my opening statement or my opening remarks.
    But certainly I just want to highlight that, you know, that 
CBP's--of course, are a combination of interdiction and intel 
capabilities. Our border search authorities puts us in a very 
unique position with regards to the fight against fentanyl.
    So we issued our new strategy to combat fentanyl and 
synthetic drugs in October of last year, which really is 
addressing kind-of the current environment, the changing 
threat. In that focus, and working together with our Department 
colleagues, our fellow law enforcement colleagues within the 
Department, as well as with the interagency, have really kind-
of focused significantly on that effort and just kind-of the 
stats alone that in fiscal year 2023 CBP seized well over 
27,000 pounds of fentanyl at our border and, you know.
    Mr. Ivey. Let me reclaim my time. I apologize. I am curious 
about, you know, which ports are which with respect to 
fentanyl, textiles, minerals. I don't know how extensive the 
Border Patrol--I guess you are probably at every port of entry, 
but, you know, hearing more about how that works and which 
testing is done where would be great.
    Then if I could get one last question in. One of the issues 
that I have heard the challenge is for putting more entities on 
the list is bad companies have figured this out and they are 
starting to take steps to cover their tracks. I guess that goes 
to some extent to the supply chain mapping piece that was 
mentioned a moment ago.
    But what sorts of things can we do? To the extent--I don't 
want you giving tips to the importers about what is there and 
what to circumvent, but to the extent you can tell us about it, 
what sorts of things are you doing to defeat that effort to 
cover their tracks?
    Ms. Brzozowski. I'd actually maybe take a first stab at 
this, but maybe put it in a slightly different light with 
regard to the importers. I think the vast majority of importers 
are as repulsed by this abhorrent practice as we are and 
actively taking steps to eradicate it from their supply chain. 
So I think we've got partners in them and need to leverage not 
only their capabilities, but also use them to enhance ours. So 
a lot of these tools and a lot of these analytic tools and 
anecdotes that we're getting about the impact it's having are 
coming from importers and from the private sectors who have 
really extensive capabilities to be mapping their own supply 
chain.
    I think what we're trying to do is send a very strong 
demand signal with our enforcement, with our ramping up of the 
Entities List that this is serious and that we'll work with 
importers to make sure they have the information they need to 
be compliant, but that the consequences for noncompliance will 
be severe and that they will be held accountable.
    In the flip side of that, making sure that there's an 
appreciation of the fact that diverse and resilient supply 
chain, not only in this case, have a--are the right thing to do 
to combat forced labor, but have an economic and resiliency 
benefit to companies as well.
    Mr. Ivey. I am noting I am running over my time and I 
apologize to the Chair, but if we could get comments from the 
last two on the panel on the same. I apologize for cutting you 
off, but.
    Ms. Lee. Thank you, Ranking Member Ivey.
    Just to add to what Assistant Secretary Brzozowski said, I 
think there's no question that companies and the Chinese 
government are taking steps to obfuscate the supply chain and 
so on. So I think that just speaks to how important it is that 
we ramp up all the work that we've talked about today with 
respect to supply chain tracing, with respect to enforcement.
    I think that the point that Assistant Secretary Brzozowski 
made also that there is an enormous burden and an obligation on 
the part of the ultimate companies, the companies at the top of 
the supply chain, to make sure that they are aware of and 
taking steps to remove these entities from their supply chain. 
They have the power to do that. I think that the Uyghur Forced 
Labor Prevention Act, the rebuttable presumption, the forced 
labor import ban in whole or in part, is a tremendously 
powerful tool and that we are, I think, doing everything within 
our power.
    I think the resources that CBP and DHS and DOL and the 
other Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force agencies have are 
essential to making sure that we can do the research and follow 
through, to make sure that we are able to trace the complicated 
corporate structures and the complicated supply chains in order 
to be able to do our best job to enforce this law.
    Mr. Ivey. Let me give Mr. Choy the last word.
    Mr. Choy. Well, I echo Deputy Under Secretary Lee's 
comments and as well as Assistant Secretary Brzozowski's. I 
couldn't say that any better. Thank you.
    Mr. Ivey. Thank you so much. I appreciate it.
    Chairman Bishop. The gentleman yields back.
    It is perfunctory in these hearings to thank the witnesses 
for appearing, but I really want to do that earnestly today. I 
have had occasion more than once to be critical of the either 
forthcomingness or the preparedness of witnesses before 
committees. This has been an exceptional panel of witnesses. I 
always have particularly high regard for Customs and Border 
Patrol, and certainly those of you at serving in the other 
departments' agencies represented here. But thank you very 
much.
    The Members of the subcommittee may have additional 
questions for the witnesses, and we would ask you to respond to 
those in writing if they are forthcoming. Pursuant to committee 
rule VII(D), the hearing record will be held open for 10 days.
    Without objection, the subcommittee stands adjourned.
    [Whereupon, at 11:26 a.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]



                            A P P E N D I X

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            Question From Honorable Mike Ezell for Eric Choy
    Question. Major solar panel manufacturers Hanwha Q-Cells and Maxeon 
have been the supplier for utility scale projects in Mississippi. 
According to the Sheffield Hallam University report titled ``Over-
Exposed: Uyghur Region Exposure Assessment for Solar Industry 
Sourcing,'' Q-Cells and Maxeon have a ``very high'' risk of ties to 
forced labor in Xinjiang. With respect to Q-Cells, the Sheffield Report 
found Meike Solar Technology, a Chinese company which gets raw material 
from Xinjiang, reported Q-Cells as one of its largest customers in the 
first half of 2022, even though Q-Cells claims it cut off the 
supplier's relationship in 2021. When major solar manufacturers are 
allowed to import panels made with Xinjiang polysilicon it hurts 
domestic manufacturing, including the Mississippi polysilicon industry. 
Without detaining Q-Cells and Maxeon imports, how can you be sure 
they're not using Chinese polysilicon tainted with forced labor from 
Xinjiang?
    Answer. The Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) presumes 
that all commodities and inputs, from raw material to parts to finished 
products, from the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) are made 
with forced labor. U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has 
reviewed the Sheffield Hallam University report cited in your question 
extensively and has used this, along with CBP analytical tools and 
resources, to evaluate risk of solar products subject to enforcement 
and we have adjusted our targeting of shipments accordingly. 
Unfortunately, CBP cannot comment on specific investigations or provide 
details pertaining to specific detentions because this information may 
be law enforcement sensitive and/or subject to business 
confidentiality.
    CBP employs a dynamic, risk-based approach to enforcement that 
prioritizes action against the highest-risk goods based on current data 
and intelligence to prevent prohibited goods from entering the United 
States. CBP enforcement efforts safeguard all industries from unfair 
trade practices. However, some industries, such as solar and textiles, 
have seen increased scrutiny due to open-source reporting on the use of 
forced labor in the production of raw materials used in their supply 
chains.
    Using the resources provided by Congress, CBP is strengthening our 
forced labor enforcement efforts by investing in personnel, training, 
outreach, technology, and laboratory science capabilities. The agency 
is using technology to map supply chains and research high-risk 
commodities to ensure supply chains are free of forced labor and XUAR 
inputs.
    Additionally, CBP is increasing its analytical and threat detection 
capabilities. CBP developed and operationalized analytic models that 
identify entities operating in XUAR, their affiliates, entities with 
whom they share traits or characteristics, and indicators of evasion 
activities (e.g., illegal transshipment) to help further our analysis 
and enforcement efforts related to UFLPA. Solar panel shipments are 
subject to close UFLPA review and CBP's team of specialists conduct 
extensive supply chain reviews to ensure shipments released into the 
United States are not made with raw materials from the XUAR. CBP 
understands that there are companies actively trying to evade CBP 
enforcement of the UFLPA, which is why CBP is continuously revising and 
strengthening its enforcement procedures to stop those importers who 
are still seeking to import forced-labor tainted products. Since UFLPA 
implementation began on June 22, 2022, CBP has conducted over 3,700 
reviews of supply chain tracing documentation provided by solar 
importers subject to detention under the UFLPA and will continue to 
strengthen its processes to maximize enforcement in this sector.
    CBP continuously engages with importers and emphasizes that they 
have the ultimate responsibility to proactively monitor their supply 
chains, which they know better than anyone, to mitigate the risk of 
importing goods into the United States that were produced with forced 
labor. As stated in the Xinjiang Supply Chain Business Advisory updated 
on July 13, 2021, ``businesses that do not exit supply chains, 
ventures, and/or investments connected to Xinjiang could run a high 
risk of violating U.S. law.'' All entities whose supply chains touch 
the XUAR should undertake due diligence to ensure compliance with U.S. 
law. Section VI of the Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force's UFLPA 
Strategy provides due diligence and supply chain guidance for 
importers.

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