U.S.-TRADE: Clinton Uncertain On ‘Fast Track’ Push

By Jim Lobe Reprint | | Print |

Jim Lobe

WASHINGTON, Sep 10 1997 (IPS) - Recoiling from treacherous political waters, President Bill Clinton Wednesday called on Congress to quickly approve long-awaited “fast-track” legislation to negotiate new trade agreements with Latin American and other countries – but then declined to offer a specific proposal.

Instead, Clinton said he intended to consult further with Congress before submitting a final proposal that could achieve “full bipartisan support.”

Further delay in presenting a final fast-track proposal will make it unlikely that Congress will approve the measure before Clinton travels to Venezuela, Brazil, and Argentina in mid- October, legislative analysts told IPS.

The administration had hoped Clinton would have fast-track authority in hand in time for his trip, to give a boost to his goal of negotiating a Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) by 2005.

“He’s going to look a lot less credible on this without fast- track,” noted one disappointed administration trade official.

Wednesday’s White House ceremony was originally intended to launch a high-powered campaign for fast-track legislation. Instead, it turned into a major fiasco, demonstrating that – after months of consultation with Congress – Clinton remained undecided about how to proceed.

Angered by what they saw as a retreat from indications that Clinton would go along with their proposals, key Republican lawmakers boycotted the event. Business leaders, who see new free trade accords like the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), as critical to their plans for expansion overseas, expressed exasperation over the president’s 11th-hour equivocation.

The political stakes – especially for Clinton’s Democratic Party – are huge. Veteran Wall Street Journal analyst Albert Hunt recently described it as “a looming calamity” for the party, which could split badly over the issue.

Fast-track legislation gives the president the authority to negotiate trade agreements with foreign governments without having to worry that they could then be amended by Congress. Under fast- track rules, once the president submits a pact for approval, Congress can only approve or reject it.

Granted routinely by Congress since the early 1970s, fast-track authority first became controversial in the early 1990s, when President George Bush began NAFTA negotiations with Canada and Mexico.

Critics expressed concern that a free trade accord with Mexico could result in large job losses in the United States and worsening pollution along the border, as U.S. firms rushed southwards to take advantage of much cheaper wages and weaker environmental regulations.

When running for president in 1992, Clinton identified himself with these concerns and subsequently negotiated labour and environmental “side agreements” with Canada and Mexico.

But NAFTA foes – who now constitute a majority of Congressional Democrats – argue that these side accords have proven largely ineffective because they do not provide for tough sanctions against governments and industries which violate labour rights and environmental standards.

Most Democrats – led by House of Representatives Minority Leader Richard Gephardt and backed by labour, environmental and consumer groups – say they will not support any fast-track legislation that fails to assure that future trade pacts will include strong protections for worker rights and the environment.

Business groups and most of their Republican allies, on the other hand, have long opposed the inclusion of labour and environmental conditions in new trade agreements.

As a result, Clinton has spent most of the last three years stuck between the two camps, stymied in his hopes of gaining fast- track authority to negotiate new agreements with Chile and other Latin American countries which have spent their time striking free- trade deals with some of Washington’s top competitors.

Amid increasing pressure and panic from the business community, Clinton pledged last spring that he would send a fast-track proposal to Congress in September.

Late last month, the Republican chairman of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee, Bill Archer, said he would support fast- track legislation that included environmental and worker protections, provided that they were “directly related to trade.”

Although the wording seemed to rule out conditions that would ensure enforcement of minimum-wage laws or cross-border pollution controls, the White House suggested that it would go along.

That endorsement produced a major revolt in Democratic ranks, according to Congressional aides, who said Clinton’s failure to produce a specific proposal Wednesday suggested that the backlash was much stronger than the White House had expected.

The situation is made even more delicate by the emerging struggle between Gephardt and Vice President Al Gore over the right to succeed Clinton. Publicly, Gore says he favours fast- track, but his aides are among the most worried about the political consequences of his backing legislation that is certain to antagonise labour unions and environmental groups.

That was underlined at an anti-fast track rally which took place in Lafayette Park, across the street from the White House, Wednesday morning. “We’re going to say ‘no to fast-track’ when we go to vote on election day,” warned Linda Chavez-Thompson, executive vice president of the American Federation of Labour- Congress of Industrial Organisations (AFL-CIO), the confederation of labour unions.

She was joined by the president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Ron Carey, whose recent successful strike against United Parcel Service (UPS) has been depicted as a watershed in the rebuilding of the U.S. labour movement. “We’re sick and tired of trade agreements that benefit big corporations instead of working people,” he said, noting that Clinton was originally elected on a promise to “put people first.”

Fast-track foes are determined to forge a link in the public’s mind between fast-track authority and NAFTA, which, according to virtually all public surveys, remains very unpopular. “People First, No NAFTA,” was one of the featured slogans at Wednesday’s rally.

Fast-track supporters are also gearing up for a major fight. Some of the country’s most highly paid executives are passing the hat to fund a multi-million-dollar campaign. A coalition of businesses gathered under the banner ‘America Leads on Trade’, has already raised three million dollars for a major media effort.

The companies say that NAFTA’s effect on job losses in the United States has been greatly exaggerated by fast-track foes and that, without new trade accords, U.S. businesses and workers risk losing out to their foreign competitors in Latin American and Asian emerging markets, which are growing at three times the rate of the industrialised world.