US Needs Trade Enforcement Tools for Labor & the Environment — NOT New Powers for “Big Tech”

For Immediate Release
June 8, 2021

“Whatever the strengths and weaknesses of the overall package passed by the Senate, America’s working families need policymakers to create trade enforcement tools that advance labor and environmental rights — not to establish new powers for ‘Big Tech’ to undermine gig economy worker protections, civil rights, consumer privacy and product safety measures around the world.  The Senate got that wrong, but the House now has an opportunity to fix it.

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“If enacted as written, the Senate package would mark the first major expansion of ‘Special 301’ trade review and enforcement tools in decades.  Instead of keeping with the Biden administration’s worker-centered trade agenda and expanding enforcement tools to ensure that trading partners live up to internationally-established labor and environmental standards, the Senate bill instead advances the interests of a narrow set of massive corporations within the digital economy.

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“Couched in terms of fighting online censorship in China, these new Big Tech enforcement provisions apply worldwide and require the U.S. government to penalize any country that enacts various gig economy worker protections, civil rights protections, consumer privacy protections, product safety protections and pro-competition policies that could ‘disrupt digital trade’ or ‘create barriers to digital trade’ for U.S. tech firms.

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“Americans are sick of so-called ’trade’ policies that privilege corporate interests at the expense of working people, consumers and the environment.  Prioritizing the interests of Big Tech giants within the rapidly-changing digital economy, while ignoring the needs of working people and the planet, would only worsen this well-deserved distrust.  The House can help advance a new, people-centered model of international trade by insisting that harmful Big Tech provisions in the ‘China bill’ are replaced with new labor and environmental enforcement tools before any final package becomes law.”