TRADE-U.S.: Fast-Track Push Stalls in Congress

By Jim Lobe Reprint | | Print |

Jim Lobe

WASHINGTON, Oct 5 2001 (IPS) - A major push by Republicans in Congress to provide President George W. Bush with “fast-track” authority to negotiate new trade agreements stalled Friday against a near- solid wall of Democratic opposition.

In a short but angry meeting, the Republican chairman of the House of Representatives Ways and Means Committee, Bill Thomas, announced that a scheduled vote on the bill would be postponed until at least next Tuesday. Democrats accused Thomas and U.S. Trade Representative Robert Zoellick of trying to ram the bill through at a moment of national crisis.

The delay marked a major victory for labour unions, environmental groups and the House Democratic leadership, who have demanded that any fast-track trade authorisation include strong and enforceable provisions for protecting worker rights and the environment.

The decision to wait until Tuesday “is an indication of just how weak the support for this bill is and just how divisive fast track is,” said Richard Trumka, the secretary-treasurer of the biggest US trade union federation, the AFL-CIO.

“At a time when Americans are facing a national crisis following the Sep. 11 attacks, we need more unity, not less, and so it is deeply disturbing that supporters of fast track trade legislation see this moment as a golden opportunity to push through an agenda that had no chance of passage prior to Sep. 11,” Trumka added.

The delay also marked a setback for Zoellick’s hopes of getting Congress to approve fast-track authority before next month’s World Trade Organisation (WTO) ministerial meeting in Qatar, where Western governments hope to launch a new round of multilateral trade negotiations.

“If they can’t get more Democrats on board by next week,” one Congressional aide told IPS, “the chances of getting fast track through before the WTO are very, very low.”

Fast track, renamed ‘trade promotion authority’ by Bush, is considered a necessity for by presidents to negotiate major new trade accords – be they under the WTO or for the Free Trade Agreement for the Americas (FTAA) – because Congress cannot amend them after they are concluded. Under parliamentary rules, fast track requires an up-or-down vote by Congress on an entire trade package.

Until 1995, Congress regularly approved fast-track authority. But, faced with rising protectionist pressure from labour unions and increasing concerns about the environmental and other implications of the 1993 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the creation of the WTO, a solid majority of Democrats defeated efforts by former president Bill Clinton and Republican majorities in both houses to renew it.

Democrats, led by Minority Leader Dick Gephardt, have demanded that new trade accords include provisions that require Washington’s trade partners to guarantee core labour rights, as defined by the International Labour Organisation (ILO), and environmental protections. Any fast-track legislation, in their view, must include such provisions.

In addition, they want to correct what they see as a major flaw in NAFTA, called Chapter 11, which allows private companies to sue foreign countries for banning their products for environmental reasons. In one particularly notorious case, a Canadian manufacturer sued California for banning the use of a gasoline additive that can contaminate drinking water.

A majority of Republicans, on the other hand, have opposed the inclusion of any environmental and labour rights conditions in new trade agreements. They have argued that Democratic concerns are really masks for traditional protectionism and should be referred to other, more relevant international agencies, such as the ILO.

The gap between the two parties has resulted in impasse. Clinton failed to forge a bipartisan package in the last years of his administration. Zoellick also tried to engage all sides in the first six months of Bush’s reign but was similarly frustrated.

The burst of patriotic and bipartisan fervour – and Bush’s stunning rise in the polls – that swept the country and Congress after last month’s attacks spurred Zoellick and pro-trade Republicans into a major new effort backed by powerful business associations such as the Business Roundtable.

In a series of speeches and articles, Zoellick argued that opening markets through new trade agreements should be considered a key front in the new “war” against terrorism.

“Earlier enemies learned that America is the arsenal of democracy; today’s enemies will learn that America is the economic engine for freedom, opportunity,” he wrote in the Washington Post Sep 20. “Trade is about more than economic efficiency; it promotes the values at the heart of this protracted struggle.”

Thomas, who quickly gathered four pro-trade Democrats to endorse his bill, jumped on the bandwagon but many Democrats were outraged by Zoellick’s inference that patriotism required support for fast track.

“The flag is up, and we are all supposed to salute,” complained Representative Charles Rangel, the top Democrat on the Ways and Means Committee and normally a trade supporter. “But they are walking on very thin ice if they think that they can rush this through.”

Others were harsher. “Zoellick engages in shabby political profiteering when he tries to piggyback fast track onto our nation’s reawakened patriotic fervour,” said Rep. Marcy Kaptur, a strong labour partisan. “Americans believe that eradicating terrorism does not mean they want to keep exporting good-paying jobs and undermining our nation’s manufacturing and agricultural infrastructure.”

In order to appeal to Democrats, Thomas’s bill includes a provision citing labour rights and environmental protection as negotiating objectives in future trade accords. But it does not include any mandate for enforcement.

In a counter-move, the Democratic leadership submitted its own plan which would include in fast-track authority a requirement that trading partners adhere to core ILO standards and guarantee that Washington and other governments maintain their multilateral environmental agreements even when these conflict with new trade accords.

In addition, the Democratic plan calls for the creation of a congressional oversight board to determine whether specific trade pacts meet minimal worker rights and environmental standards before they are submitted to an up-of-down vote in Congress.

Neither Thomas nor Zoellick, who has not explicitly endorsed Thomas’s package, has yet indicated any inclination to compromise. Most observers believe that the Thomas package, as it is now, has the support of some 180 Republicans, leaving it 40 votes shy of a majority.