When David Rashid started looking into why his auto parts company was losing ground to Chinese competitors, he thought he knew what he’d find. Lower wages, maybe. Looser regulations. The usual suspects.
What he didn’t expect was a vast web of state subsidies, brazen duty evasion, and a system that seemed rigged to let China play by its own rules — regardless of the cost to American workers.
“I feel like I’m screaming into a void sometimes,” Rashid, the executive chairman of Illinois-based Plews & Edelmann, said on a recent episode of The Manufacturing Report podcast. “It’s just so frustrating. I mean, President Trump has made it clear that trade is the very critical piece of his overall agenda, yet everyone wants to keep the status quo.”
People aren’t really willing to put new legislation in place that helps us crack down on this. So we’re going to keep fighting. That’s all we can do is keep fighting.
Rashid is not alone in his frustration. Joining him on the podcast was Betsy Natz, the CEO of the Kitchen Cabinet Manufacturers Association, who has seen firsthand the devastation that unfair Chinese trade practices can wreak on an industry.
“We had a surge of imports coming in from China that were at 50 to 60% less than the price of U.S.-made cabinets,” Natz explained. “And so, as a result of that, we filed a trade case.”
That case, like the one Rashid’s company filed, resulted in hefty anti-dumping duties on Chinese imports. But thanks to a variety of dirty tricks — from transshipping products through third countries to outright fraud — many Chinese exporters have simply shrugged off the tariffs and kept right on dumping.
The result? A staggering $2 billion in uncollected duties, according to Natz’s estimates. And while the U.S. government has made some progress in recent years to crack down on these practices, loopholes still abound.
It’s a head scratcher, you know, in terms of people aren’t really willing to, you know, put new legislation in place that helps us crack down on this.
It’s a problem that goes far beyond any one industry or company. When Chinese exporters are allowed to cheat the system with impunity, it doesn’t just hurt the bottom line of American manufacturers — it devastates entire communities.
Natz pointed to the example of a cabinet plant in Virginia that was forced to close its doors due to Chinese competition, putting nearly 300 people out of work in a single small town. Many of those workers, she noted, were over the age of 40 — a demographic that often struggles to find new employment after a layoff.
“Once that manufacturing plant leaves that community, that [job] is gone,” Natz said. “It’s gone. The odds are high they’ll never work again on a full-time job.”
The human toll of these trade crimes is what drove Rashid and Natz to form the Alliance for Trade Enforcement Now, a coalition of companies and industry groups dedicated to fighting back against unfair trade practices.
The group has already made some headway, supporting legislation like the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act and lobbying for changes to obscure rules like the “de minimis” threshold, which allows low-value imports to skirt tariffs altogether.
But for real progress to happen, Rashid argues, it will take a concerted effort from both the public and private sectors to close the loopholes that let cheaters prosper — and to put American workers first.
“We’re cautiously optimistic,” he said of the alliance’s efforts. “But there’s a lot behind that word, cautious.”
In the meantime, the alliance is focusing on education and outreach, hosting a website at enforcementnow.com that serves as a clearinghouse for information on trade crimes and how to fight them. The site also features a petition that companies can sign to show their support for stronger enforcement measures.
So far, the alliance has attracted 40 member companies, ranging from small startups to multi-generational manufacturers. But Rashid and Natz know that there’s strength in numbers — and they’re hoping that more of their peers will join the fight.
Because at the end of the day, this isn’t just about abstract concepts like trade balances or tariff codes. It’s about the livelihoods of real people in real communities across the United States.
It’s about the plant manager in Virginia who had to look his team in the eye and tell them they no longer had jobs. It’s about the father in Illinois who’s wondering how he’ll support his family now that his company has gone under. It’s about the sense of dignity and purpose that comes from making something with your own hands — and the fear of losing that forever.
These are the stories that drive Rashid and Natz to keep fighting, even when the odds seem stacked against them. Because they know that if they don’t, the cost to American workers will only continue to grow.
“That’s all we can do is keep fighting,” Rashid said.
And for the sake of the millions of jobs hanging in the balance, let’s hope they do just that.
To learn more about the Alliance for Trade Enforcement Now and its mission to combat unfair trade practices, visit enforcementnow.com. You can also hear David Rashid and Betsy Natz’s full conversation with Scott Paul on The Manufacturing Report podcast, available on all major podcasting platforms.
