NAFTA Critic Rep. DeLauro Says Pence Is Wrong to Say Some Democrats 'Will Never Get to Yes'
Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., a leading NAFTA critic and member of the Democrat working group negotiating for changes to the NAFTA rewrite, told a radio host in Connecticut that the working group has not yet closed the gap between the Trump administration and House Democrats on any one of the four areas where they are seeking changes. Those areas are labor standards, the environment, enforcement and the biologics exclusivity period.
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DeLauro characterized the fact that Mexico and Canada would have to increase patent protections to 10 years for those drugs as "a gift to the pharmaceutical industry." She said biologics are the most expensive drugs, and some cost $150,000 a year, and said that this provision "locks in those prices."
But, in response to a question during the radio show's call-in from International Trade Today, she said that the right kind of labor standards and enforcement "absolutely" could stop outsourcing to Mexico. She said the fact that manufacturing workers in Mexico are being paid $1.50 or $2 an hour has led to about a million job losses in the U.S., with 100,000 losses in Connecticut.
She said if the Mexican labor reform is going to be nothing more than good ideals, "we are going to continue to put our workers at great risk." While she declined to put any timeline on reaching agreement, she denied that she or others will always oppose free trade with Mexico. "The vice president [Mike Pence] ... and there are others who say there are some of us that will never get to yes. Well, that is untrue," she said. But she said to win her approval, the new NAFTA will have to "make fundamental changes" in order to make sure U.S. workers are the prime beneficiaries of the trade pact. "If this renegotiated NAFTA is nothing more than throwing a little bit here and a little bit there," she said, it won't be enough.