Chinese e-commerce giant Temu under increased congressional scrutiny and facing problems in China
Chinese e-commerce giant Temu is facing renewed scrutiny from Congress, with members of the Ways and Means Committee warning about the company’s “use of forced labor and ties to the Chinese Communist Party,” Rep. Claudia Tenney (R., N.Y.) told the Washington Reporter.
Temu’s alleged reliance on forced labor gives it an unfair advantage over small business owners located in her district, Tenney added.
Tenney’s pointed criticisms come as members of both political parties in both houses of Congress have relentlessly attacked the company before for its violations of laws such as the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA), “all but guaranteeing that shipments made by Uyghur forced labor are entering American homes,” the bipartisan Select Committee on the CCP noted last year.
“Temu admitted that it ‘does not expressly prohibit third-party sellers from selling products based on their origin in the Xinjiang Autonomous Region,’” the select committee found last year. “The only measure Temu reported that it takes to ensure that it is not shipping goods to Americans that are produced with forced labor in violation of U.S. law was that its suppliers agree to boilerplate terms and conditions that prohibit the use of forced labor.”
Rep. Beth Van Duyne (R., Texas), who also sits on the Ways and Means Committee, recently wrote to Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas about the need to “revoke [Temu’s] privileges to import products into the U.S. to prevent goods made from forced labor from crossing over our borders.”
Concerns about Temu aren’t just stateside. A group of suppliers, “mainly smaller outfits that sell Chinese goods to Western shoppers…brandished placards and yelled slogans outside a Guangzhou company outpost,” Bloomberg reported. “Some managed to get into Temu offices though they eventually dispersed without meeting senior executives, according to several witnesses, who asked not to be identified for fear of retribution.”
Bloomberg also reported that Temu is losing money on each sale while being subsidized by Chinese government-controlled entities, raising more concerns for Congress among both Republicans and Democrats. Our sources expect more oversight of Temu’s data collection efforts, and whether its U.S. sales are focused on intellectual property and data theft instead of profits.
