S920-119

In Committee

Preventing Child Labor Exploitation in Federal Contracting Act

119th Congress Introduced Mar 10, 2025

Analysis under review: This bill has generated analysis that may be too generic or incomplete. Clause-level evidence remains available below.

Summary

The Preventing Child Labor Exploitation in Federal Contracting Act requires companies seeking federal contracts to disclose whether they have been found guilty of child labor violations in the past three years. Companies with unresolved violations would be barred from receiving federal contracts for at least four years. The bill dramatically increases civil penalties for child labor violations from ,000 to ,000 (and from ,000 to ,000 for serious cases). It also mandates training for federal employees on identifying and preventing child labor violations and requires a GAO study on the prevalence of child labor violations among federal contractors. No new funding is authorized.

Evidence Chain:

This summary is generated from the full bill text using AI analysis. Expand "Detailed Analysis" below for identified beneficiaries/burden bearers.

At a Glance

What This Bill Does

Prevents child labor exploitation in federal contracting by requiring disclosure of child labor violations, barring violators from federal contracts, increasing civil penalties for child labor violations, and mandating interagency training.

Who Benefits

  • Child workers protected from exploitation
  • Compliant federal contractors

Who Bears Costs

  • Federal contractors with child labor violations
  • Companies using subcontractors with violations

Key Policy Areas

{'domain': 'Labor', 'evidence': 'Amends Fair Labor Standards Act child labor provisions (Sec. 4), requires contractor certifications re child labor violations (Sec. 3)'}, {'domain': 'Government Procurement', 'evidence': 'Amends Federal Acquisition Regulation to require representations and certifications from entities contracting with executive agencies (Sec. 3)'}

Primary Purpose

Prevents child labor exploitation in federal contracting by requiring disclosure of child labor violations, barring violators from federal contracts, increasing civil penalties for child labor violations, and mandating interagency training.

Policy Domains

{'domain': 'Labor', 'evidence': 'Amends Fair Labor Standards Act child labor provisions (Sec. 4), requires contractor certifications re child labor violations (Sec. 3)'} {'domain': 'Government Procurement', 'evidence': 'Amends Federal Acquisition Regulation to require representations and certifications from entities contracting with executive agencies (Sec. 3)'}

Legislative Strategy

"Leverage federal procurement power to enforce child labor laws by barring violators from government contracts and significantly increasing financial penalties"

Legislative Progress

In Committee
Introduced Committee Passed
Mar 10, 2025

Mr. Hawley (for himself and Mr. Booker) introduced the following …

Mar 10, 2025

Read twice and referred to the Committee on Health, Education, …

Mar 10, 2025

Introduced in Senate

Stakeholder Effects

cui bono?

How this legislation distributes effects. Mention counts reflect frequency, not effect magnitude.

Government
6 mentions across 4 clauses
-5 negative ?1 uncertain

Department of Health and Human Services, Department of Homeland Security, Department of Labor

Government Contractors
3 mentions across 2 clauses
+1 positive -2 negative

Compliant federal contractors, Federal contractors, Federal contractors with child labor violations

Positive-direction: Compliant federal contractors

Negative-direction: Federal contractors, Federal contractors with child labor violations

Labor
3 mentions across 3 clauses
+3 positive

Child workers

Business
1 mention across 1 clause
-1 negative

Employers who violate child labor laws

7/8
sections analyzed
Full impact breakdown

Bill Structure & Actor Mappings

Who is "The Secretary" in each section?

Domains
Labor
Actor Mappings
"Secretary"
→ Secretary of Labor
"executive agency"
→ As defined in 41 USC 133
Domains
Government Procurement Labor
Actor Mappings
"Secretary"
→ Secretary of Labor
"Federal Acquisition Regulatory Council"
→ Body that amends FAR
Domains
Labor
Domains
Labor
Actor Mappings
"Secretary"
→ Secretary of Labor
Domains
Government Operations
Actor Mappings
"Comptroller General"
→ Head of GAO
Domains
Government Operations

Key Definitions

Terms defined in this bill

3 terms
"appropriate committees of Congress" §2(1)

HELP Committee (Senate) and Education and Workforce Committee (House)

"executive agency" §2(2)

As defined in 41 USC 133

"Secretary" §2(3)

Secretary of Labor

We use a combination of our own taxonomy and classification in addition to large language models to assess meaning and potential beneficiaries. High confidence means strong textual evidence. Always verify with the original bill text.

Learn more about our methodology