Pushing for Trade
Senator Dorgan supports expanded foreign trade, but insists that it must be fair and mutually beneficial trade. Our trading partners must open their markets to our products. And American companies must be prevented from moving U.S. jobs overseas to take advantage of sweatshop labor and conditions that allow them to dump chemicals into the air and water.
We have the highest trade deficits in recorded human history — we import over $2 billion a day more than we export. This has cost the U.S. three million manufacturing jobs. By 2015, another three million U.S. service sector jobs are expected to be lost to overseas locations.
Senator Dorgan has fought against flawed trade agreements, and is working to advance legislation that seeks to force a change in direction for trade policy.
- As Chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on Interstate Trade, Commerce and Tourism, Senator Dorgan will chair a series of oversight hearings to examine President Bush’s request for renewal of “fast track” trade negotiating authority, which allows the Executive Branch to negotiate trade treaties with foreign countries and submit those agreements for approval to the Congress. Congress must then vote “yes” or “no” – with no possibility for amendments. As a result, fast track has produced a series of trade agreements lacking strong, enforceable mechanisms to protect our labor and environmental standards, as well as our economic and national security interests.
- Senator Dorgan has introduced the Decent Working Conditions and Fair Competition Act, S. 367, which would crack down on overseas sweatshop abuses. Read the one-page summary of the legislation.
- Senator Dorgan is also working on legislation that would set a ceiling on the U.S. trade deficit. Congress routinely tries to define a ceiling for our budget deficits, but it has never tried to set a ceiling for the trade deficit. We must do so before our skyrocketing trade deficit comes tumbling down on our economy. Senator Dorgan’s bill would require that when a trade deficit ceiling is reached, the President would have to convene an emergency interagency summit to take prompt action to correct the deficit.
- The largest share of the United States’ trade deficit is due to our unbalanced trade relationship with China, a country that fails to live up to its commitments against piracy and sweatshop production. We currently have a $232 billion trade deficit with China. Senator Dorgan has introduced a bill to withdraw permanent normal trade relations (PNTR) status from China to demand more equitable trade.
Senator Dorgan supports expanded trade. North Dakota is a major agricultural producer, and we need export markets for our products. He is working hard to open new foreign markets — and has been a leader in making it possible for American family farmers to sell their crops in Cuba.
But it hurts us — rather than helps us — when our trade negotiators have no spine. It hurts us, for instance, when we accept the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) that allows the Canadians to dump an avalanche of U.S. wheat into the U.S. market, while preventing us from selling American wheat to Canada. And it hurts us when our negotiators allow China to erect high tariffs against U.S. automobiles — at the same time that China is gearing up a major auto export industry.
Senator Dorgan will keep fighting to change our course on trade and stop new trade agreements from ignoring U.S. interests.
