For Immediate Release
August 27, 2008
U.S. Senate Candidate Details His Views on Trade
Jeff Merkley Shares His Positions on Existing and Proposed Trade Pacts with the Oregon Fair Trade Campaign
Portland, OR — U.S. Senate Candidate Jeff Merkley detailed his views on trade policy in a questionnaire released today by the Oregon Fair Trade Campaign.According to his responses, Merkley believes that the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) has been severely damaging to the U.S. economy and that it should be renegotiated.If elected Senator, he says he will support legislation that outlines mandatory criteria for what must and must not be included in future trade agreements, and that establishes a process for reviewing and renegotiating existing trade pacts.
“Voters in Oregon and across the nation believe that trade deals like NAFTA have hurt working people.It makes sense that candidates are articulating what they would do to change existing trade policies if elected,” said Arthur Stamoulis, director of the Oregon Fair Trade Campaign.
In his questionnaire responses, Merkley voiced opposition to the Bush administration’s pending free trade agreements with Colombia, Panama and South Korea, and stated that he would oppose a future president’s attempts to reestablish Fast Track trade promotion authority. He also expressed support for:
- Preventing U.S. higher education and health care from coming under the jurisdiction of the World Trade Organization;
- Eliminating investment provisions in trade agreements that grant foreign investors greater rights than U.S. citizens;
- Safeguarding the ability of state governments to maintain “prevailing wage,” “Buy America” and “recycled content” purchasing preferences; and
- Requiring that only food that meets U.S. safety standards is allowed to enter the United States.
Jeff Merkely is scheduled to address the Democratic National Conventiontoday in Denver. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee selected him as one of only a handful of Senate candidates to speak at the convention. His race against incumbent Senator Gordon Smith has been ranked as one of the most competitive Senate races in the nation.
“That a candidate running on such a strong trade platform has been selected as representative of the Democrats’ best candidates nationwide shows just how important trade has become as an election issue,” said Stamoulis.
In a previous questionnaire released by the Oregon Fair Trade Campaign in May, presidential candidate Barack Obama expressed a similar belief that NAFTA has done more to hurt than to help the U.S. economy and that the United States needs to change the way it conducts international trade.
At the time, public opinion polling by the Pew Research Center found that, “There is now broad agreement that free trade negatively affects wages, jobs and economic growth in America.By greater than six-to-one, the public says free trade agreements result in job losses rather than in new jobs.”
Gordon Smith and John McCain failed to respond to the Oregon Fair Trade Campaign’s questionnaires.Completed questionnaires by Jeff Merkley and Barack Obama are available online at: www.oregonfairtrade.org.
The Oregon Fair Trade Campaign is a statewide coalition of more than twenty labor, environmental and human rights organizations that advocates for trade policies that prioritize quality jobs in communities across Oregon; create markets for Oregon products by raising living standards in neighboring countries; enforce consistent standards for labor and the environment across borders; and allow local producers to compete on a level playing field.