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Sherrod Brown has 88 amendments for this week's fast-track bill
The same number of counties in his state of Ohio: 88
He's doing this because as it stands now, TPA fast-track which sets the standard for future trade deals including the TPP & TTIP, sucks.
With corporate and labor interests watching, Sherrod Brown has 88 amendments for this week's foreign-trade deal
4/20/15
...At stake this week is a new bill to grant trade promotion authority, or TPP, to President Barack Obama and his successor, regardless of political party. TPP is better known as fast-track authority, because it gives a president the authority to implement trade agreements with other nations without interference from Congress. The last fast-track bill expired in 2007.
The latest bill lays out a series of objectives and protections that Congress wants to see in any new trade deal, particularly the big one that Obama wants to wrap up soon, the Trans-Pacific Partnership. If Congress decided that this or future deals did not address its objectives, it could block or change the new trade treaty as long as 60 senators agreed.
But a number of senators, and especially Brown, want to make sure the objectives are clear and enforceable.
Some of Brown's amendments would:
* Close an existing loophole that allows countries that use forced or child labor to export their products to the United States.
* Increase training and financial aid to workers who lost their jobs due to foreign trade. Brown wants $575 million a year, a level in force temporarily during the height of the recession.
* Make the president notify Congress when a trade agreement is about to go into force and allow Congress to review it. There can be a lag between the signing of a trade deal and its implementation, and Brown says he wants Congress to be able to see if anything has changed.
* Make the administration provide detailed annual reports, with data for each state, showing the effect of imports.
Although import data is now available from the Commerce Department, it is not always easily digestible, and critics say that like any data, it is open to statistical manipulation.
A recent example of this was seen when Democratic lawmakers including U.S. Reps. Marcy Kaptur of Toledo and Tim Ryan of Niles accused U. S. Trade Representative Michael Froman's office of playing games with the data. Froman's office said its statistics were accurate and that Congress members were trying to "cook the books."
Brown also has amendments addressing worker safety standards, environmental standards and currency manipulation. Countries with weak safety standards can produce goods more cheaply because they don't spend money protecting their workers from harm or they operate sweatshops of the kind the United States outlawed long ago. The same goes for countries that don't make their factories adhere to environmental standards.....
http://www.cleveland.com/open/index.ssf/2015/04/with_corporate_and_labor_interests_watching_sherrod_brown_has_88_amendments_for_this_weeks_foreign-trade_deal.html
4/20/15
...At stake this week is a new bill to grant trade promotion authority, or TPP, to President Barack Obama and his successor, regardless of political party. TPP is better known as fast-track authority, because it gives a president the authority to implement trade agreements with other nations without interference from Congress. The last fast-track bill expired in 2007.
The latest bill lays out a series of objectives and protections that Congress wants to see in any new trade deal, particularly the big one that Obama wants to wrap up soon, the Trans-Pacific Partnership. If Congress decided that this or future deals did not address its objectives, it could block or change the new trade treaty as long as 60 senators agreed.
But a number of senators, and especially Brown, want to make sure the objectives are clear and enforceable.
Some of Brown's amendments would:
* Close an existing loophole that allows countries that use forced or child labor to export their products to the United States.
* Increase training and financial aid to workers who lost their jobs due to foreign trade. Brown wants $575 million a year, a level in force temporarily during the height of the recession.
* Make the president notify Congress when a trade agreement is about to go into force and allow Congress to review it. There can be a lag between the signing of a trade deal and its implementation, and Brown says he wants Congress to be able to see if anything has changed.
* Make the administration provide detailed annual reports, with data for each state, showing the effect of imports.
Although import data is now available from the Commerce Department, it is not always easily digestible, and critics say that like any data, it is open to statistical manipulation.
A recent example of this was seen when Democratic lawmakers including U.S. Reps. Marcy Kaptur of Toledo and Tim Ryan of Niles accused U. S. Trade Representative Michael Froman's office of playing games with the data. Froman's office said its statistics were accurate and that Congress members were trying to "cook the books."
Brown also has amendments addressing worker safety standards, environmental standards and currency manipulation. Countries with weak safety standards can produce goods more cheaply because they don't spend money protecting their workers from harm or they operate sweatshops of the kind the United States outlawed long ago. The same goes for countries that don't make their factories adhere to environmental standards.....
http://www.cleveland.com/open/index.ssf/2015/04/with_corporate_and_labor_interests_watching_sherrod_brown_has_88_amendments_for_this_weeks_foreign-trade_deal.html
So yes, plenty of people have read the TPA, including Senator Brown, and it is seriously lacking.
Since this has now passed the house, we need to hope at least some of Sen Brown's amendments will pass before the rethug majority senate passes this TPA fast track bill.
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