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No mourning for Fast Track expiration

Date Posted: July 20 2007

WASHINGTON (PAI) - Union leaders and lawmakers cheered the end of President George W. Bush's "trade promotion authority," also known as "fast track," at midnight on June 30.

Fast track trade legislation allows the president to negotiate trade deals that Congress must approve in an up or down vote without making changes. Over the past five years fast track has been in place, organized labor has complained that the U.S. should require its national trading partners to have worker standards for issues like child labor and sweatshops. Congress cannot make such trade requirements under fast track - but it can now that the rule has expired.

But that doesn't not mean unionists still don't face fights on trade.

That's because Bush got four trade pacts signed before the deadline with Peru, Panama, Colombia and South Korea. Lawmakers must still vote on legislation to implement those pacts under the old fast track rules.

Priorities for the new Democratic-run Congress "do not include the renewal of fast track," said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other Democratic leaders said in a joint statement. "Before that debate can even begin, we must extend benefits of globalization to all Americans."

Pelosi said Dems would strongly oppose the South Korean and Colombian free trade pacts, which still come under the fast track rules. That statement drew praise from United Steelworkers President Leo Gerard, whose union is leading the opposition to the Colombian trade pact.

USW helped survivors of murdered Colombian unionists sue for damages against U.S.-based multi-nationals - who were allegedly complicit in the murders - in U.S. courts.

"Business-as-usual trade agreements that have resulted in rising trade deficits, stagnating incomes, millions of lost jobs and shuttered factories should be a thing of the past," Gerard stated. "Agreements with Korea and Colombia do not merit congressional support in their current form. In Colombia, thousands of trade unionists have been killed and the government has not even begun to really address the problem. Concrete and lasting progress on the ground must be achieved before any discussion of expanded trade relations can be considered."

Speaking for Republicans who support Fast Track, House Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) said "Congress should send a clear message to our international trading partners that America will resist protectionism and remain fully engaged in the global economy and we should start by renewing TPA."

AFL-CIO President John Sweeney praised Democratic leaders for forcing Bush to insert workers' rights - the International Labour Organization standards - into the texts of the Peru and Panama pacts. But he called that only "a first step down the long road towards deep reform of U.S. trade policy," and warned "Democratic leaders must remain vigilant to ensure Bush will aggressively and consistently enforce these new provisions."