Good morning. The U.S. will block imports from 26 Chinese textile companies over their alleged ties to forced labor, a move that follows U.S. industry complaints about unfair competition.

On Thursday, the Department of Homeland Security announced the addition of 26 companies to what is known as the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act Entity List. The list names businesses that the U.S. alleges are involved in exploiting forced labor from China’s Xinjiang region, home to the Uyghur people and other minority groups.

• Complaints stateside: The additions dramatically swell the size of the UFLPA list, which following a change in methodology, brings the total number of banned companies to 65. All the companies named Thursday are part of China’s textile industry, whose dominance has led to complaints of unfair competition from manufacturers stateside.
   
• Crackdown: The move comes amid a broader U.S. crackdown on the import of goods tied to forced labor, and in particular those from Xinjiang, a region known as a source of cotton, solar panel components and other goods, but also for alleged wide-scale human rights abuses. China has repeatedly denied those allegations.
   
• Fans in Congress: Toughness on the Xinjiang human rights situation has been a point of near consensus in Congress. The bipartisan heads of the Congressional-Executive Committee on China issued a joint statement lauding the move. "We enthusiastically endorse DHS's action today," said Rep. Christopher Smith and Sen. Jeff Merkley. "We are committed to robust enforcement of the UFLPA and want to see even more actions taken by DHS to do so."

In quest for metals, U.S. pitches deal to ease sanctions on Israeli businessman.

The Biden administration and the Democratic Republic of Congo have proposed a plan to reduce sanctions on an Israeli mining magnate accused of corruption in exchange for his permanent exit from the African country.

The plan involves the U.S. extending some sanctions relief to businessman Dan Gertler, whom it accused more than six years ago of corruption, to allow him to sell his assets in Congo to the government and end his dealings in the country, senior administration officials said. The asset sales could potentially hand Gertler tens of millions of dollars.

Chinese retailer Temu under fire from European consumer groups.

Temu, the discount retailing app owned by Chinese e-commerce giant PDD Holdings, is facing consumer complaints that its business practices violate a new online content law in Europe, one of the company’s fastest-growing markets.

The European Consumer Organization on Thursday filed a 26-page complaint with the European Commission alleging that some of Temu’s business practices are in breach of requirements regarding product traceability, among others.

• Attorney General Merrick Garland has officially initiated the process to reschedule marijuana, the Justice Department said Thursday, moving a proposal to reclassify it as a less dangerous drug one step closer to enactment.
   
• The Supreme Court on Thursday rejected a conservative-backed challenge that could have dismantled the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

Microsoft asks hundreds of China-based AI staff to consider relocating amid U.S.-China tensions.

Microsoft is asking hundreds of employees in its China-based cloud-computing and artificial-intelligence operations to consider transferring outside the country, as the American tech behemoth finds itself caught in the crosshairs of escalating U.S.-China tensions.

Such staff, mostly engineers with Chinese nationality, were recently offered the opportunity to transfer to countries including the U.S., Ireland, Australia and New Zealand, people familiar with the matter said. About 700 to 800 people were given the offer, the bulk of whom are involved in machine learning and other cloud-computing tasks, one of the people said.

Treasury again warns of money-laundering risks posed by lawyers, accountants.

The U.S. Treasury Department is again casting an eye on the money-laundering threats posed by lawyers, accountants and other professionals, even as it rolls out a corporate ownership database and finalizes ambitious new regulations for the investment and real-estate industries.

On Thursday, the department reiterated the possible threat presented by professionals including trust formation agents in a report outlining its strategy for countering illicit finance. In 2021, the Biden administration listed several professional groups, often referred to as “gatekeepers” of the U.S. financial system, as an area of focus in its campaign to target corruption.

In 2022, lawmakers weighed legislation that would have extended money-laundering rules to lawyers and other groups, including private-equity firms. The legislation, however, didn’t get the support needed to be included in that year’s defense spending bill.

“We continue to assess the risks,” a Treasury official said during a press briefing session Thursday. “We will keep [Congress] apprised and, of course, ask for additional legislative authorities as needed.”

–Dylan Tokar

• The assassination attempt on Slovakia’s leader has thrown a light on the growing polarization in European politics, where vicious fighting between populist politicians and their staunchest critics has been exacerbated by the war dragging on to the east in Ukraine.
   
• The eurozone’s financial system faces less acute threats to stability as it appears increasingly unlikely that the currency area’s economy will slide into a deep recession, the European Central Bank said.
   
• Russia launched a satellite into space in February 2022 that is designed to test components for a potential antisatellite weapon that would carry a nuclear device, U.S. officials said.
   
• Universities’ commencement ceremonies have largely occurred without significant disturbances in recent days.

• Dozens of big companies that dropped dividends during the pandemic haven’t resumed them, raising the question: “Is this the equivalent of long-term Covid?”
   
• As cyber threats rise, nearly half of compliance professionals surveyed by WSJ said they had only a basic or novice level of expertise in overseeing cybersecurity-related compliance.
   
• Top-ranking lenders are getting less of their money back when companies go bankrupt as many firms head into chapter 11 with less junior debt.
   
• Coke’s new attached-cap design is rattling European consumers, and smacking many of them in the face.
   

🎧 Listen to eBay’s CFO and chief AI officer discuss the online marketplace’s plans for investing in and using AI resources.

• The Supreme Court ruled Thursday in favor of Stuart Harrow, a 73-year-old federal employee, allowing him to continue his now 11-year quest for six days of back pay stemming from a 2013 furlough. The Wall Street Journal featured a front-page story earlier this month about Harrow’s unlikely legal saga.
   
• What happens when you open a public livestream between two major cities? As New York City and Dublin learned this past week, people go wild.
   
• Working a regular day, even into the evening, is for mere mortals. Those out to impress start well before dawn.

Follow us on X at @WSJRisk. Follow Risk & Compliance editor David Smagalla @DSmagalla_DJ and reporters Mengqi Sun @_MengqiSun, Dylan Tokar @dgtokar and Richard Vanderford @VanderfordRich.

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