Quick Take

Linking Forced Labor to Trade Competition: The Strategic Value and Structural Limitations of Section 301 Investigations

Isabelle Glimcher

March 17, 2026

Last week, the US Trade Representative (USTR) announced investigations into 59 countries and the EU related to forced labor. While these investigations continue the US government’s focus on forced labor as a basis for trade enforcement, and importantly center forced labor as a trade issue, it remains unlikely that they will get to the root of the global forces that drive and facilitate forced labor. More likely, they will merely serve to provide a new pretext for re-imposing many of the tariffs struck down by the US Supreme Court.

The investigations have been initiated under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974, which empowers the USTR to investigate “unjustifiable, unreasonable, or discriminatory foreign government practices that burden or restrict US commerce.” The investigations aim to “determine whether acts, policies, and practices of each of these economies related to the failure to impose and effectively enforce a ban on the importation of goods produced with forced labor are unreasonable or discriminatory and burden or restrict U.S. commerce.” This comes just one day after the USTR announced investigations against 15 countries and the EU “relating to structural excess capacity and production in manufacturing sectors,” and less than three weeks after the US Supreme Court struck down the administration’s tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA).

These investigations are part of a growing focus by the US government on forced labor. Under the Tariff Act, goods made in part or wholly with forced labor cannot be imported into the US, and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) is empowered to detain goods it has reason to suspect have been made partially or wholly with forced labor by issuing a Withhold Release Order (WRO). The 2021 Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) strengthened this enforcement by establishing a rebuttable presumption that goods mined, produced, or manufactured wholly or in part in Xinjiang, or by entities on the UFLPA Entity List, are made with forced labor and thus prohibited from entering the US. Under the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), Mexico and Canada are also required to investigate and ban imports made with forced labor. Notwithstanding this requirement, Mexico and Canada are among the countries being investigated.

Perhaps most crucially, these investigations highlight forced labor as a trade and competition issue. As the Federal Register Notice states, forced labor “threatens domestic producers who must compete with foreign goods produced with an artificial cost advantage.” Indeed, individuals forced to work typically receive minimal or no wages, and work inhumane hours, making the cost of the goods they produce artificially lower. Framing forced labor as a competition issue rather than a human rights issue—though it is, of course, both—may facilitate more consistent and stronger penalties, thereby disincentivizing companies from allowing forced labor to exist in their supply chains.

The investigations, however, focus only on whether a country has and enforces a forced labor import ban. They do not intend to assess the existence of forced labor in the domestic production in the target country, notwithstanding the fact that forced labor risk is well-documented and mapped; high risk industries and geographies have been consistently identified by civil society and the US government itself. The countries included and excluded also raise questions about the motivations behind these investigations. For example, the list of countries subject to these investigations includes Switzerland and Norway, which are ranked numbers one and two on the list of countries with the lowest prevalence of modern slavery, and excludes the Democratic Republic of the Congo, which has well-documented forced labor issues in cobalt mining, much of which ends up in the US.

The investigations are also somewhat surprising as enforcement of the US forced labor import ban is down over the last few years, and CBP has been repeatedly criticized for the inadequate procedural safeguards it employs in issuing Withhold Release Orders. At the same time, the EU Forced Labor Regulation is also set to take effect in 2027, with guidance expected this summer.

Written comments and requests to appear at the hearing are due April 15, 2026, and hearings are scheduled for April 28 to May 1. The USTR has specifically requested comments on the existence and efficacy of forced labor import bans in the named countries, unfair competition patterns, negative impacts on US commerce, and what duties and import restrictions should be imposed to address these issues.