President Joe Biden will sign a bill that would ban all goods from the Xinjiang region in China, where millions of Uyghurs are being forced to work in concentration camps, the White House said Tuesday.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki made the announcement during a briefing in Washington.
“We have been clear that share Congress’s view that action must be taken to hold the PRC accountable for its human rights abuses and to address forced labor in Xinjiang,” she said, referring to the People’s Republic of China.
The approved text will be updated and fresh votes will need to be held on the updated version, per an agreement between Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.).
“We will be moving our bill through both chambers & to President Biden’s desk as quickly as possible,” McGovern said in a statement.
The White House provided input on the changes, though Psaki declined to share details.
“Our effort is often to provide technical assistance to ensure that bills are implementable,” she said.
The ruling Chinese Communist Party has ramped up efforts to surveil and imprison Uyghurs, including introducing strict social capital systems and throwing millions into forced labor camps that churn out products purchased by countries around the world.
The forced labor act has attracted opposition from large companies like Nike and Coca-Cola, which use factories in Xinjiang to make products.
“It’s big corporations who benefit from slave labor problem,” Rubio wrote on Twitter this month.
