The signing of the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act by President Joe Biden on Thursday has experts fearing consequences and pain for U.S. businesses, not to mention difficulties in enforcing it.
Congress "just brought down the hammer," American Association of Exporters and Importers President Eugene Laney warned to Politico.
"So there's more of an enforcement environment and not an informed compliance," he continued. "We've got to be careful when we sit down with Customs and Border Protection [CBP] and create these compliance regimes so it doesn't put a lot of these companies out of business.
"The challenge is this spiderweb of different fourth and fifth and sixth and seventh and eighth tier suppliers that [U.S. firms] have to comb through to determine whether forced labor is a part of their supply chain. It's very different from the export control world or the world of sanctions where companies know the countries they're forbidden to do business with."
A source from a business group representing the interests of U.S. firms in China added the law "forces American businesses to prove a negative and that's actually impossible to do," but has admitted his lobbying efforts against the bill "hit a wall with our traditional supporters."
Enforcing the law will prove difficult, too, particularly with China's control over its businesses and traditional lack of transparency worldwide, U.S.-China Chamber of Commerce President Siva Yam said.
"I don't know how they're going to even implement [the law], and I think it's very difficult for people to independently verify one way or the other," Yam told Politico.
The law bans all imports from China's Xinjiang region, but trade experts note not all manufacturing from Chinese Uyghurs is the result of forced labor, setting up the potential punishment of Chinese Uyghurs who are making a justifiable living in supporting supply to the American economy.
Former ambassador-at-large for anti-trafficking John Cotton Richmond told Politico the law will "shift the burden to companies to show that there's not a use of forced labor in a region's [products] and I think it's going to have a huge impact on importers.
"If all of [U.S.] business withdraws from Xinjiang, Uyghurs that are currently being exploited there are going to be driven into poverty," he added to Politico.
"There's going to be a potential humanitarian crisis."
But the White House has been under pressure to show tough action on China's human rights abuses and a diplomatic boycott of the Beijing Winter Olympics was criticized for not going far enough.
"We agree with Congress that action can and must be taken to hold the People's Republic of China accountable for genocide and human rights abuses and to address forced labor in Xinjiang," White House press secretary Jen Psaki said last week.
A bipartisan, bicameral group pushed the legislation forward, led by Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla.; Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore.; Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J.; and Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass.
"If you're a company who is manufacturing in that area, you're going to need to prove that slaves didn't make it," Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., said last week. "The presumption is on you."
But former CBP trade lawyer Richard Mojica told Politico proving to be in compliance is "practically impossible."
"Some industries have more history of tracing back all the way up the supply chain to the cotton or the raw materials," Mojica said. "For some others, like the solar industry, it's been an absolute fire drill, and companies are just having to do the best they can to get that level of visibility."
China has pushed back on the law, rebuking it as "political manipulation and economic bullying in the name of 'human rights,'" according to Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian on Dec. 15.
That will further China's lack of transparency, Mojica added to Politico.
"We've seen firsthand [Chinese] suppliers saying, 'We're not comfortable providing information on whether something comes from Xinjiang or not,'" he continued, "'because we're concerned about local law considerations in assisting you — U.S.-based multinational — comply with your laws.'"
Eric Mack ✉
Eric Mack has been a writer and editor at Newsmax since 2016. He is a 1998 Syracuse University journalism graduate and a New York Press Association award-winning writer.
© 2026 Newsmax. All rights reserved.