Manufacturers in Haiti Getting Mixed Signals From Capitol Hill on HOPE/HELP Renewal

Uniform Advantage owner Susan Masimore said 95% of the scrubs and lab coats her company makes are sewn in Haiti, in a factory the company owns near the border with the Dominican Republic. Masmiore has been meeting with congressional staffers, pushing for HOPE/HELP's continuance, though she met very briefly with House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, who controls the House calendar.

"They agree it’s important, it needs to be renewed," she said the staffers tell her. The trade preference was part of a must-pass funding bill in December, but before it passed Congress in March, it was slimmed down after complaints from Elon Musk.

"Yes, they want it to happen, but they don’t really know how it will happen," Masimore said, describing what she hears from staffers. She said Democrats are "super in favor," but since they're not in power, they cannot move the bill. Some staffers tell her Congress might act in September. "Some are saying they need a signal from the White House," she said. A few staffers were neutral, saying, "if it goes in, we won’t oppose it."

Because the federal government is only funded through Sept. 30, the same day HOPE/HELP -- and the African Growth and Opportunity Act -- expire, including the renewal in the next continuing resolution could be a natural fit.

Masimore said that's what she's asking for.

Jay Ogburn, vice president of supply at the Superior Group of Companies, said 95% of the scrubs his firm makes are at a leased facility in Haiti, at the same industrial park where Uniform Advantage operates. The other 5% are made in Madagascar, which receives tariff benefits via AGOA. They employ 1,423 people in Haiti.

Ogburn said the head of his company has made multiple trips to the Hill, and will go again June 25, and has talked to both members and staff, from both parties.

"Honestly we get zero negativity at all" on HOPE/HELP, he said. "Yet it doesn't move forward. That's the frustrating part."

Ogburn said that there is more disagreement on AGOA, where some members want some countries removed from eligibility, or added to the program.

He doesn't understand why Congress wouldn't act to help the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. "Why would we punish a country that literally has nothing?"

He said it's "very difficult" to get politicians' attention. "It’s just too many other things going on in the world. This tax bill has taken a life of its own," he said.

Virgilio Mota is responsible for CODEVI Industrial Park, where Superior, Uniform Advantage and eight other factories that export to the U.S. operate. Three years ago, it had 22,000 workers. It's down to 14,000, but the criminal gangs in Haiti aren't why -- its location isolates it from the troubles, and the goods are exported from a Dominican Republic port. Rather, he said, it's mostly because companies aren't sure HOPE/HELP will be renewed.

Mota said when he lobbies members, he doesn't hear any opposition -- but they want to know if the White House opposes it. "Every time we’re talking to members of Congress," he said, they're asking: "What are you hearing from the administration, are you talking to the administration?"

Although both President Donald Trump and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent have said that the hike in tariffs is not designed to bring apparel manufacturing back to the U.S., the 10% tariffs on Haiti and nearly every other country don't exclude clothing.

Mota noted that Secretary of State Marco Rubio visited the Dominican Republic early in his tenure, and he spoke about what these programs mean for Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Rubio was also the lead sponsor of renewal when he was in the Senate.

Most of the goods made in Haiti come into the ports in Florida, and to the extent that companies are making knit apparel that uses American yarn, that's exported through Florida ports.

Mota said he hasn't been able to get his message to the executive branch. "It’s been very difficult to find the appropriate channel to talk to the administration," he said, though he has asked the lead sponsors in the House and Senate to talk about the issue with the White House and U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer. Mota said that Greer has said that HOPE/HELP is "the least we can do for Haiti."

Mota has asked staffers and members if the renewal could be done on the suspension calendar in the House and through unanimous consent in the Senate, given the lack of opposition in either party.

The Caribbean Basin Trade Partnership Act, which covers some apparel in Haiti, as well as the Dominican Republic, passed that way in 2020. "Everyone in Congress seems to agree that [unanimous consent] would be very difficult," he said. "It would only happen if they get a clear signal from the White House that we can renew the program through [unanimous consent]."

Ogburn, who said his company would move away from Haiti as soon as the fabric supplies were exhausted without the tariff breaks, is pessimistic about a timely renewal. He gave it odds of less than 15% for a passage before Sept. 30. "I don’t see it happening," he said.

Without the renewal, his company might look to Bangladesh or Vietnam. It probably wouldn't expand in Madagascar, given the lack of certainty with AGOA.

The problem for Ogburn and Masimore, of course, is they don't know if these countries will be hit with high reciprocal tariffs, given their trade surpluses with the U.S.

Masimore said her company has enough fabric for a year's worth of production in Haiti, and even without a renewal, it won't shift that work elsewhere. But, she said, she has to make a decision by late August on where to send fabric for the spring of 2027 runs.

She said that she moved to Haiti about 10 years ago because she was finding contractors in Vietnam would not meet their deadlines if they got a bigger order from some entity like Wal-Mart. She'd have to shift back gradually because companies would not have the capacity to take all of her work immediately.

"My company, because we own the factories, we would probably shift back for fall '27," she said. She said she thinks Madagascar could be cost-competitive even if AGOA is not renewed -- if the 47% threatened reciprocal tariff doesn't become a reality.

It's not clear if she'll know what reciprocal tariffs will apply when she has to make her next order, given the fact that the July 9 pause might be extended.

"We don’t know what’s going to happen, I’m assuming inflation is going to go nuts" if the Liberation Day tariffs are applied, she said.

She said her firm has eaten the 10% tariff on Haitian exports, but cannot absorb the 23% most favored nation average she would pay if the trade preferences expire. (The U.S. has a trade surplus with Haiti, so Haiti's Liberation Day rate was 10%.)

"It is pretty questionable if our customer has the appetite to pay more," she said. She said employers often give new hires $150 to buy scrubs; she doesn't think they'll increase that if she has to raise prices.

Where she sells directly to health care organizations, there's nothing in the contracts that says she can charge more if tariffs change.

If all the countries that are equipped to sew scrubs face high tariffs, "what will happen, the demand will slow down for all of us," she said.

If her business falls by even 10%, she'd have to lay off workers. If it falls by 20%, she said, companies like hers would be down to "bare bones and hope you can pay your bills."