Dear Senators and Representatives:
As the leaders of almost 20 million U.S. workers and their families, we share your commitment to strengthening the middle class. To rebuild our economy for America's hardworking families, we ask you to join us in opposition to "fast track" trade promotion authority (also known as TPA).
Fast track trade deals mean fewer jobs, lower wages, and a declining middle class. Fast track has been used since the Nixon Administration to advance deals, like NAFTA, that are sold to the American people as job creation measures. But these deals, written largely by and for the world's largest corporations, don't create jobs: their main purpose isn't even related to trade, it's to enshrine rules that make it easier for firms to invest offshore and increase corporate influence over the global economy.
Fast track is an undemocratic, unaccountable and completely unacceptable way to develop economic policies that affect us all. America needs a new version of trade negotiating authority that brings the process out from behind closed doors and prioritizes making life better for people, instead of just making life easier for corporations. Working people have heard enough broken promises about the benefits of fast track. It's time to stop believing the fairy tale that passing one more fast track trade deal is going to have different results.
If you stand for higher wages, more jobs, and greater opportunities for America's hardworking families, you must oppose fast track.
Sincerely,
Richard L. Trumka
President
Elizabeth H. Shuler
Secretary-Treasurer
Tefere A. Gebre
Executive Vice President