"This industry needs help, and it needs help now," the senior Democratic senator said in a statement. "The president must replace his textile trade team and appoint officials who understand the depth and seriousness of the impending crisis. There is no time to waste.

Hollings' demand came one day after textile industry officials announced their intention to file dozens of petitions asking the Bush administration to impose emergency restrictions on imports of clothing, sheets and towels from China.

US textile companies expect a dramatic surge of imports from the Asian giant when an approximately five-decade-old quota system expires at the end of the year.

They want the Commerce Department to approve new restrictions based on that threat, rather than wait to see if there is a rapid increase in imports.

But in an interview with Women's Wear Daily, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Commerce for textiles Jim Leonard said the department has no developed procedures to approve "safeguard" restrictions based on the threat of a surge.

"The procedure we've got out there deals with market disruption," Leonard said. "If we do anything different, we will have to come up with something different."

That comment raised Hollings' concern that the Bush administration did not recognize the urgency of the situation facing domestic textile firms, a Hollings aide said.

"This Administration just doesn't seem to get it. Since President Bush took office in January 2001, over 345,000 textile and apparel workers have lost their jobs -- 27,000 in South Carolina alone," Hollings said.