Trade Coalition Presses Congress on Trade Pacts, TPA

A group 200 organizations pressed House Ways and Means and Senate Finance leadership to pass a Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) bill to help push forward pending trade pacts, such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, in an April 2 letter from the Trade Benefits America coalition. The letter preceded U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman’s appearance before the Ways and Means Committee on April 3 (see 14040318). The Senate Finance hearing set to host Froman was rescheduled to April 30 (see 14040221). “As members of the Trade Benefits America coalition, we strongly support ambitious outcomes in these trade negotiations and passage of modernized Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) legislation,” said the letter. “TPA has long been an important tool for helping complete high-standard U.S. trade agreements. In fact, all U.S. free trade agreements (FTAs) since 1974 except one (the U.S.-Jordan FTA in 2000), or 14 agreements, were concluded pursuant to TPA. The GATT Tokyo Round and World Trade Organization (WTO) Uruguay Round agreements were also concluded pursuant to TPA.”