...The Gibson facility wasn’t raided over allegations of tax evasion, charges of embezzlement, or even something as drab as child labor. Not even close. It was raided over what the DOJ deems an inability to follow a vague domestic trade law in India (one that apparently the Indian government didn’t seem too concerned about enforcing) regarding a specific type of wood. Not illegal wood, just wood with obscenely specific procedural guidelines.
It seems the Lacey act, in its strenuous effort to care more about an exporting country’s laws than that country may care itself, invites every curious jot and tittle to be freshly interpreted by US courts. It is a trap at the beck and call of any administration for any reason. This isn’t the only time this has happened. I’d be pretty sure that China is overlooking a lot of bureaucratic minutia in the process of expediting the export of megatons of junk to the US, and nobody seems to be caring about applying Lacey to China.