the largest free trade agreement since nafta and members should know that this agreement has the potential to expand to a number of additional countries without congressional approval. the administration has said that they would -- it would welcome interest from other nations including china in joining t.p.p. given the impact that trade deals like nafta have had on american businesses and workers i would argue that it is important that congress not only be notified of new negotiations but also have the opportunity to vote on whether or not to move forward with bringing on additional countries into multinational trade negotiations. if congress were to approve the trans-pacific partnership it should not and must not be a blank check to bring in additional names -- additional nations without congressional approval. i am public concerned about countries that manipulate the value of their currency to gain an unfair advantage over our u.s. workers. steal intellectual property from american innovators. engage in unfair labor practices. damage the environment and do not abide by existing

promises. and, you know, the more i hear it the more i hear the echos of the nafta debate. now, that was a long time ago and i was here then. in 1988, i voted for fast-track authority to allow the administration to negotiate the north american free trade agreement. then five years later i saw the deal. it was a bad deal, and i voted no. but it was too late because when i saw the deal, i knew i couldn't fix it because that's what fast-track is. and what this majority here today is saying to us is, vote for fast-track and give up your right, senator boxer from amending this trade agreement. so they say well, it's very transparent. go down and look at it. well let me tell you what you have to do to read this agreement. follow this: you can only take a few of your staffers who happen to have to have a security clearance -- because god knows why, this is secure; this is classified. it has nothing to do with defense. it has nothing to do with going after isis. it has nothing to do with any of that. but it is classified. so i go down with my staff that i could get to go with me, and a

of this discussion, and that is the nafta playbook, the playbook for trade in the 1990's, is gone and it is a new day in trade policy. so i have summarized mr. president, why the trade promotion act is not the trade policy of the 1990's, is not the north american free trade agreement and what we're going to do today is essentially start with the question of how vigorous trade enforcement ought to be at the forefront of america's trade policy in 2015 and beyond and how our new approach on enforcement is different than the policy of the 1990's. the reality is, you can pack trade agreements full of lofty goals and principles. you can amass all of the enforcement ideas you might want. but it doesn't do any good, mr. president, if you don't have real enforcement tools and you make sure that they aren't locked in a shed. and, in my view, that has been happening for way way too long. the status quo on trade enforcement simply no longer does the job. and as i've listened for many months to senators on both sides of the aisle, i believe there's widespread recognition that our approach to t

. president the obama administration says trust us. forget what they said about nafta. forget what they said about korea. forget what they said about china. this one is different. really really. cross our fingers hope to die. this one is really, really different. yes, it may be true that every corporation in america corporations that have shut down factories in this country moved to china they're supporting this agreement. yeah it's true that wall street whose greed and recklessness have almost destroyed the american economy they're supporting this agreement. yes, it is true that the pharmaceutical industry who charges us the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs, they're supporting this agreement. but not to worry, we should trust these guys. they really are thinking of the american middle class and working families. trust us. when they tell us a trade agreement will be good for working people, yes, we should really trust them. meanwhile every trade union in america, the vast majority of environmental groups in this country, they are saying be careful about t.p.p. vote "no

, rather than approveably job-killing trade agreement as nafta was as pntr was as cafta was, as south korea was. we know the real answer. this deal amounts to more empty promises. if it were really good for the american worker, why can't the american worker see it? more corporate handouts, more worker sellouts. as many of my colleagues know, this trade agreement simply doesn't work for us. here's what was' wrong with the trade promotion authority. with china, there is no darn tee it won't join -- no guarantee it won't join later. there is no agreement that china can't back door into this agreement without a vote of congress without examination from the american public. second, what happens to american competition? american workers are paid a living wage. in vietnam the average is $3 a day. how do we compete with that? with currency, we know china gamed the currency system year after year after year. they don't play by the same rules as we do. in corporations, shift from democratically elected government to governments of corporations. we've seefn it -- seen it in tobacco, seen it in m

is point number one. when you ask folks specifically what you oppose, they just say nafta. nafta was passed 20 years ago. that was a different agreement. in fact, disagreement exists some of what was wrong with nafta and making labor and environmental provisions actually enforceable. i was just getting out of law school when nafta got passed. [laughter] [applause] number three, you've got some critics saying that any deal would be rushed through. it is a secret deal. people don't know what is in it. this is not true. any agreement that we finalized with the other 11 countries will have to be posted on 94 at the 60 days before i even sign it. then it would go to congress. and you know they are going to do anything fast. [laughter] there will be months of review. every t. crossed, every i..a. everyone will see what is in it. there is nothing abstract about this. this is a very deliberate plan. which will be subject to scrutiny and i'm confident when people read the agreement for themselves, they will say this is the most progressive trade deal in history. number four, critics warn

nafta trade playbook is being set aside. mr. president, i'm going to be brief at this point but i'd just like to give a little bit of history as to how we got to this point. mr. brown: mr. president would the senator from oregon yield for a moment? thank you. i want to thank senator wyden for his work on the customs bill that we will be debating, the bill to which he's referring. especially his amendment that we worked on on prohibition of child labor closing an 85-year loophole, if you will, allowing child labor in far too many cases and we as a nation were importing goods produced by child labor. i appreciate his support and senator hatch's support early in the process before the markup began on our level the playing field language which is important to a number of industries to make the playing field more level as senator wyden was sane, and third the importance of currency. we know how many jobs we've lost in my state and all over the country because of what's happened with people gaming -- countries gaming the currency system. i just wanted to express my thanks to senator wyden

working america has done very poorly under this goal of geostrategic influence. yeah, we had nafta north american free trade greavment. we had cafta the central american free trade agreement. and what was the result of that? well we lost five million jobs in america. we lost five million jobs. we lost 50,000 factories. if you go around oregon, you can see these factory sites. i was out recently to visit the blue herring site. a few years ago there were hundreds and hundreds of workers at the blue heron paper factory but under the structure of one agreement, w.t.o., those jobs went to china. paper manufacturing went to china. and the equipment was pulled up out of that factory leaving a big hole and shipped overseas. that's what happened. we lost our factories. we lost our jobs. now, there's been a lot of discussion that this is a new trade agreement that it establishes enforceable standards for labor. welshes perhaps -- welshes perhaps the most single porn -- important standard is minimum wage. it is about exploiting the full race to the bottom. so, of course, i'm sure the proponents wou

, the senate now has the opportunity to throw the 1990's nafta playbook into the dust bin of history and begin a new forward-thinking era in trade. this can be a momentous day for creating more economic opportunity for our people transparency and sunshine, and the forward march of american values. the legislation can help us pry open the booming markets for our exports. it will strengthen the american brand in the fight against trade cheats and bad actors who block our way. it will raise the bar for worker rights environmental safeguards and human rights, and it will help strip out the excessive secrecy that makes people skeptical about trade. colleagues in a sentence, this is how you begin to get trade done right. and i yield the floor and urge support for cloture. the presiding officer: the clerk will report the motion to invoke cloture. the clerk: cloture motion, we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate, do hereby move to bring to a close debate on h.r. 1314, an act to amend the internal revenue code of 1986, si

by the nafta -- the north american free trade agreement and, by the way, many of the same interests and people that oppose that are opposing this now i.e., primarily the labor unions. and the purpose here that means eliminating this catfish program which is one of the most brazen and reckless protectionist programs that i have encountered in my time in the united states senate. the purpose of the usda catfish office is purportedly to make sure catfish is safe for human consumption. i'm all in favor of ensuring that american consumers enjoy wholesome catfish. the problem is, the food and drug administration already inexpects all seafood including catfish. the true purpose of the catfish program is to create a temporary to -- trade barrier to protect catfish farmers in two or three southern states. let's be clear what this is all about. protect catfish farmers in two or three southern states and we are endangering the entire agreement here. that's not right and it's not right for the american people. in classic farm bill politics, southern catfish farmers worked up some specious talki

1993-2002 in the aftermath of the so-called nafta north american free trade agreement. over a period of time between 1993 and 2010, the trade deficit with mexico is up by some $66 billion. and that's as of 2010, over those 17 or so years. so that's the backdrop when you you -- when we debate trade itself. i know there have been assertions made this agreement the trans-pacific partnership with 11 other countries will be different and there will be protections in there that there weren't with earlier agreements. i have real concerns about those assertions and i have doubts that they'll play out in that manner. because in the end this debate is about wages and jobs. it's really, in one sense one major issue. will this agreement and will the trade promotion authority that undergirds this agreement advance or hinder job growth and the growth of wages? i have real concerns about arguments that say it will, that it will advance job creation. one of the assertions often made is well, job loss over time, over several decades, more than one generation now that affected states like pennsylvania

nafta playbook. and it is not even the 2002 t.p.a. package, madam president. i realize the president wasn't in the senate at that time, but after my opening remarks i'm going to start outlining the 30 progressive changes in the 2015 t.p.a. package that were not in the 2002 program again to show how different this trade policy would be. but the point of what i have started with, madam president this focus on trade done right is to drive home the potential for more good-paying jobs for our workers. and this would be true in oregon utah, iowa, and across the land. in my state one out of five jobs revolves around exports and the export jobs often pay better than do the non-trade jobs. and the reason i bring this up, madam president is i don't think there is any more pressing economic issue in our country than finding ways to increase wages for americans -- and particularly the middle class and those who aspire to be middle class. and the facts demonstrate clearly that the export jobs often pay better than do the nonexport jobs. and the reason that's the case is because there is often a v

throws out the 1990's nafta playbook on trade. it is an opportunity to enact fresh middle-class trade policies that will create high-skill high-wage jobs in oregon and across our land. that opportunity is lost if this package of four bills gets winnowed down to two. mr. president, in particular, dropping the enforcement bill, in my view, is legislative malpractice. and the calculation here is quite simple. the finance committee gave the senate a bipartisan trade enforcement bill that will protect american jobs and promote american exports, which are two propositions that i believe every member of this body supports. the enforcement legislation closes a shameful loophole that allows for products made with forced and child labor to be sold in our country. this is 2015, mr. president. there is absolutely no room for a loophole that allows slavery in american trade policies. if the decision is made to drop this bipartisan legislation that shameful loophole would live on. now, any senator who goes home and speaks, as i do, about the virtues of job-creating trade policies has in my view, a

that have been already granted since the nafta, we not have -- we not have seen an uptick. in fact, we've lost 31,000 manufacturing jobs and i for one am not willing to put one more job in jeopardy in west virginia. and that's a concern we have. so what we're asking for is a very modest, very sensible very reasonable commonsense approach to do the job the people elected us to do. at this time i yield the floor to my friend, the senator from massachusetts, mr. president. ms. warren: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from massachusetts. ms. warren: mr. president, i want to thank my good friend from west virginia, senator manchin. i want to thank him for his leadership i want to thank him for his independence, yap i want to -- yap to thank him for his tranches. in the past few weeks the public has heard a lot about the trans-pacific partnership a massive trade deal the u.s. is negotiating with 11 other countries. the public has heard from supporters that it is the most progressive trade deal in history, a deal that will benefit working families and small businesses. an