In 2008, 74 members of the U.S. House of Representatives and 6 U.S. Senators co-sponsored the Trade Reform, Accountability, Development, and Employment (TRADE) Act.
Public Citizen notes that passage of the TRADE Act would mandate a review and renegotiation of harmful existing trade pacts, such as NAFTA, CAFTA and the WTO.
On April 23 of this year, the Wall Street Journal reported that, “Senator Sherrod Brown (Democrat-Ohio), a free-trade skeptic, said Wednesday he will soon (re-)introduce legislation that would effectively delay congressional consideration of the proposed free-trade pacts (with Panama, Colombia and South Korea) drafted under President George W. Bush.”
Senator Brown said in a recent speech that, “Congress should enact the Trade Reform, Accountability, Development, and Employment (TRADE) Act that I introduced last Congress and plan to re-introduce in a few weeks. The TRADE Act is a forward-looking, pro-trade legislation that requires a review of existing trade agreements, and provides a process to renegotiate existing trade agreements. It also outlines principles on labor, environment, investment, and food safety to be included in future trade agreements.”
The Council of Canadians supports the review and renegotiation of NAFTA and other harmful trade agreements.
WEB-LINKS
To read more about the TRADE Act, go to Council of Canadians trade campaigner Stuart Trew’s blog at http://canadians.org/tradeblog/?p=10.
The Wall Street Journal article is at http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124041872179144131.html?mod=googlenews_wsj.
More on the 2009 TRADE Act at http://www.citizenstrade.org/index.php.
Senator Sherrod Brown’s website is at http://brown.senate.gov/.
