Representative Ro Khanna, Democrat of California, during the National Action Network (NAN) 35th Anniversary Convention in New York, US on Wednesday, April 8, 2026.
Victor J. blue | Bloomberg | getty images
Ro Khanna, ranking member of the House China Select Committee, led a bipartisan group of lawmakers in pressing Acting Attorney General Todd Blanch for an overdue report on illegal labor practices by Chinese companies in the US auto industry.
in a new Letter Sent to Blanch on Wednesday morning and shared exclusively with CNBC, lawmakers sought an update on the report, which Congress commissioned earlier this year. This comes after CNBC joined Khanna, D-Calif., on a visit to a major auto glass manufacturer. in vitroWho accuses a Chinese competitor, FuyaoTo cut prices and drive out competition.
Khanna is joined in the letter by Representatives Shontel Brown, D-Ohio, and Scott Perry, R-Pa. and Mike Kelly, R-Pa.
“The stability and security of the American auto supplier industrial base is of utmost importance,” the lawmakers wrote in the letter. “As thousands of American workers in the auto manufacturing industry face job losses, CCP-linked companies, or affiliates of those companies, are expanding their presence in communities across the country.”
The lawmakers wrote that while Chinese companies tout a commitment to domestic employment, credible reports of labor trafficking, forced labor, and unlawful employment practices raise serious concerns that their true intention is not to contribute to the U.S. job market, but to exploit it.
Congress mandated the overdue report as part of the Commerce, Justice, Science, Energy and Water Development, and Interior and Environment appropriations bill that President Donald Trump signed in January.
The bill reports that the committee is “concerned by unlawful employment practices involving trafficking or undocumented labor in the stream of commerce of the U.S. auto parts and glass manufacturing industries, particularly as they relate to CCP-affiliated corporate entities and their affiliated companies.”
It asked the Department of Justice for a report at least 120 days after enactment of the bill on “investigative and prosecutorial steps taken against such entities implicated in forced labor supply chains and a detailed description of all associated costs to carry out these efforts.”
Khanna said in a statement that the letter comes after he “spent time at the Citadel as the ranking member of the China Select Committee to hear from workers, manufacturers and union leaders about the need to invest in American jobs to compete with China.”
He said, “What I’ve heard is that CCP-linked companies, such as Fuyao, are hurting them by not competing fairly and using illegal labor practices. The DOJ should issue the necessary report on these practices that is now overdue.”
In the letter, the lawmakers specifically targeted Fuyao. Federal law enforcement in 2024 Fuyao’s factory raided in Moraine, Ohio, as part of a civil forfeiture complaint related to an investigation into a possible $126 million illegal staffing and money laundering operation.
Lawmakers also pointed to the raid on an automotive manufacturing plant in Ohio run by a Chinese company qingdao sunsong and another raid on a manufacturing facility Wellmade Industries in Georgia.
“The legal violations enumerated above are not isolated incidents, but rather evidence of a pattern of systematic abuses by CCP-linked companies or their affiliates operating in the United States,” they wrote.
“As CCP-linked automotive supply companies or their affiliates expand their presence in the U.S. market, it is important that the DOJ and its partner agencies vigorously investigate their operations for evidence of violations of U.S. trade and labor laws,” he said.
Members requested responses by June 19. The DOJ did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.