Some corporate media outlets did not mention the concerning labor practices of popular Chinese online retailers such as Temu and Shein while covering how President Donald Trump’s recently-implemented tariffs against China targeted a tax loophole often used by the two retailers.
The president announced on Saturday that he was implementing a 10% tariff on imports from China, as well as 25% tariffs against Canada and Mexico, in an attempt to stifle the flow of illegal immigration and illicit drug trafficking from the three countries. The tariff against China also closes a “de minimis” exemption, or a tax loophole that allowed exporters to ship packages worth less than $800 per person, per day, into the U.S. duty free, often used by major Chinese online retailers.
Several recent reports on the impact of the tariffs left out the fact that both Temu and Shein have been accused of unfair labor practices, including forced labor and child labor. A May 2024 report from the watchdog group Public Eye found that Shein was subjecting some of its employees to 75-hour work weeks.
Temu previously admitted that it “does not expressly prohibit third-party sellers from selling products based on their origin in [China’s] Xinjiang Autonomous Region,” where an estimated almost 5.8 million Uyghur Muslims live in modern slavery. Both of the China-based brands have also come under scrutiny for reportedly selling toys that do not meet U.S. safety regulations and pose potentially deadly risks to infants. Experts have also warned that products and clothing from several fast-fashion retailers, including Shein, had high levels of toxic chemicals that pose potential health hazards.
Shein also said that it found “two cases of child labor” in its supply chain in 2023, according to its sustainability report released the same year. Temu and Shein alone are responsible for roughly 30% of all packages shipped to the U.S. daily under the de minimis provision, according to the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
In Trump’s executive order to implement duties on China, he wrote that the CCP “exerts ultimate control” over the enterprises within the country and said that the government has “subsidized and otherwise incentivized … [Chinese] chemical companies to export fentanyl and related precursor chemicals that are used to produce synthetic opioids sold illicitly in the United States.”
“[T]he sustained influx of synthetic opioids has profound consequences on our Nation, including by killing approximately two hundred Americans per day, putting a severe strain on our healthcare system, ravaging our communities, and destroying our families,” Trump wrote. “The CCP does not lack the capacity to severely blunt the global illicit opioid epidemic; it simply is unwilling to do so.”
Just days after Trump announced the new slate of tariffs against the three foreign nations, the U.S. and Mexico reached an agreement Monday for the U.S. to pause the 25% tariff after Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum announced that she would deploy 10,000 National Guard soldiers to the U.S.-Mexico border in an attempt to stem the flow of illegal immigration and illicit drugs into the U.S. Beijing is reportedly considering beginning trade discussions with the U.S. in the hopes to stave off the Trump administration from implementing additional tariffs on Chinese imports.
Temu and Shein did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s requests for comment.
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