Democrats Give Bush The Business on Trade; Extension of Promotion Authority in Question
As President Bush was out in Peoria touting the virtues of foreign trade and asking for fresh authority to promote it, newly ascendant Democrats on Capitol Hill signaled just how tough it's going to be for the president to get what he wants.</br></br>In a hearing, Democrats repeated earlier warnings that they are unlikely to approve pending trade pacts with Peru, Colombia and Panama unless the administration agrees to provisions tightening labor and environmental protections in those countries. They pledged to demand similar labor rules before extending the president's authority to negotiate new trade deals.</br></br>"We have had trade policies in this administration that assume that trade is an end in itself, that market forces will work themselves out, that there isn't really an active role for government," said Rep. Sander M. Levin (D-Mich.), who chairs a House subcommittee on trade. "We've had a tremendous loss of U.S. manufacturing jobs."</br></br>The new chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, Charles B. Rangel (D-N.Y.), presided over a wide-ranging discussion that touched on how to prevent companies from shifting production to exploitative factories in poor countries, how to confront China over allegedly unfair trade practices and how to help Americans who lose jobs.</br></br>The hearing took place as President Bush visited the Illinois headquarters of Caterpillar, the construction-equipment giant and a highly successful exporter. There, the president asked Congress to extend his so-called trade promotion authority -- his legal right to negotiate trade pacts that he can submit to lawmakers for a simple up-or-down vote. It expires at the end of June, and without it, trade deals stand little chance of getting through Congress as individual legislators pick them apart to protect jobs in their districts.