Republican lawmakers want Paramount Global and CBS to cancel ads from a Chinese company suspected of using child labor.
Rep. Carol Miller (R-W.Va.) and ten lawmakers demanded on Thursday that the network block Temu from spending a reported $15 million on ads during tonight's Super Bowl broadcast.
The House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party reported that Temu does not have any system in place to ensure compliance with the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, leading the lawmakers to believe that the company is using forced labor.
The letter, obtained by the Daily Caller, says:
“The Chinese Communist Party wants to profit off the United States every chance they get. It is disgusting to subject the American people to a reported $15 million worth of ads for products made with Uyghur slave labor,” Miller said in a statement to the Daily Caller. “Allowing Temu to air these ads during the most popular American sporting event would effectively be an endorsement of what the CCP stands for. I strongly urge CBS to remove any ad by Temu from the Super Bowl LVIII commercials.”
The House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party also found that Temu's parent company, PDD Holdings, engages in “substantial trademark counterfeiting or copyright piracy” through their other subsidiary company Pindoudou, the letter states.
A source close to the matter told the Daily Caller that anything Paramount Global puts up complies with U.S. law and regulation and with the company's standards.
“Temu previously used last year's Super Bowl advertisements to reach millions of Americans when the company was largely unknown in our market,” the lawmakers wrote.
One source told the Daily Caller that CBS has been calling other lawmakers' offices to ask them to not sign on to Miller's letter.
“Given some of these notable examples of Temu, Pindoudou, and PDD Holdings' blatant disregard for the rule of law in the United States, we respectfully request that your companies not air any television advertisements that either company has provided you with during your broadcast of Super Bowl LVIII and related programing. Allowing these commercials to air would be a touchdown for the Chinese Communist Party against the home team,” the letter says.
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