Today U.S. Senator Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) sent a letter to Intel CEO Patrick Gelsinger demanding answers on the company’s failure to condemn slave labor in their global supply chains and their apparent willingness to accommodate the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). This comes after Intel scrubbed all references to Xinjiang from its annual supplier letter and apologized to the CCP for implementing U.S. law.
Senator Hawley wrote, “In its December 2021 annual letter to suppliers, Intel noted that the company is ‘required to ensure our supply chain does not use any labor or source goods or services from the Xinjiang region.’ Apparently, such boilerplate language was too much for the Chinese Communist regime to abide. Only one week after the letter was published in the U.S., Intel posted an apology on Chinese social media, saying the letter was only written to ‘comply with U.S. law.’”
He continued, “Intel’s recent willingness to accommodate Beijing is startling. An objective observer could reasonably assume that your company will look away from human rights abuses if acknowledging them risks provoking the ire of a major commercial interest. And due to these actions, how can we be certain that Intel is serious about implementing requirements set forth by U.S. law with respect to forced labor?”
Senator Hawley called on Intel to clarify how they plan to ensure their supply chain is free of forced labor, whether they removed references to Xinjiang from their letter following pressure from Beijing, and whether they believe the U.S. government should do more to ensure corporate supply chains are slave-free.
Read the full letter here or below.
Patrick P. Gelsinger
Chief Executive Officer
Intel Corporation
2200 Mission College Blvd.
Santa Clara, CA 95052
Dear Mr. Gelsinger:
I write today to express my concern that Intel Corporation seems willing to support global slavery in its business practices. I would hope this is not the case, but recent actions taken by your company have not inspired confidence. It’s imperative that you provide Congress and the public with an explanation.
The State Department’s 2021 Trafficking in Persons Report made clear that forced labor – the use of force, fraud, or coercion to compel individuals to perform labor – remains a persistent challenge globally. Nowhere is this grievous practice more evident than in China’s Xinjiang region, where the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) subjects an estimated one million Uyghur Muslims and other ethnic and religious minorities to slave labor and other human rights abuses. In response to these atrocities, Congress overwhelmingly passed and President Biden signed into law the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, important legislation that strengthens our country’s bans on the importation of goods made with forced labor.
In its December 2021 annual letter to suppliers, Intel noted that the company is “required to ensure our supply chain does not use any labor or source goods or services from the Xinjiang region.” Apparently, such boilerplate language was too much for the Chinese Communist regime to abide. Only one week after the letter was published in the U.S., Intel posted an apology on Chinese social media, saying the letter was only written to “comply with U.S. law.”
Worse, Intel has now scrubbed its supplier letter of all references to Xinjiang.[1] Intel’s recent willingness to accommodate Beijing is startling. An objective observer could reasonably assume that your company will look away from human rights abuses if acknowledging them risks provoking the ire of a major commercial interest. And due to these actions, how can we be certain that Intel is serious about implementing requirements set forth by U.S. law with respect to forced labor?
Please provide my office with written responses to the following questions no later than January 31, 2022:
- How does your company plan to ensure that its supply chain is free of any forced labor if you cannot publicly make a statement of fact about Xinjiang?
- Yesterday, you said that “We found that there was no reason for us to call out one region in particular anywhere in the world because there’s many regions in the world that are having issues of such a matter.”[2] What is your company’s stance on Xinjiang in particular and the plight of Uyghur Muslims and other religious minorities there? Please provide a clear and succinct statement describing Intel’s position.
- When did your company remove references to Xinjiang from its annual supplier letter? Did your company have plans to announce the changes before they were publicly reported on?
- Did you scrub your supplier letter of references to Xinjiang out of concern that it would impact your commercial interests in the People’s Republic of China? Did the Chinese government threaten your company with any type of penalty if you failed to eliminated such references?
- What actions does your company take to ensure that suppliers and secondary suppliers do not have problematic ties to the Xinjiang region? Please describe your company’s protocols and remediation practices with respect to forced labor in Xinjiang.
- Do you think that the U.S. government should be taking more robust action to ensure that corporate supply chains do not allow global slavery to persist?
- Has Intel engaged the government of the People’s Republic of China with regard to its ongoing human rights abuses in Xinjiang and elsewhere, and if so, what was the outcome of any such engagement?
Thank you for your attention to this important matter.
Sincerely,
Josh Hawley
United States Senator