(POLITICO) Hillary Clinton is about to have her big trade moment.
The likely 2016 presidential candidate has yet to show her hand on whether she supports the latest effort to pass “fast track” trade promotion authority, but that could happen as soon as Monday morning when she takes the stage with prominent labor leaders at a Washington event put on by a liberal-leaning political think tank.
What she says there — or in coming weeks — could improve or imperil her position with unions, Democratic colleagues in Congress, the business community and the sitting president.
If she comes out for fast track, it will alienate her labor and environmental base. If she opposes the legislation, it puts her at odds with President Barack Obama and her previous support as secretary of state for the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership free trade agreement, opening her to charges of being a flip-flopper.
Progressive Democrats urging Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren to get in the presidential race want Clinton to clarify her position as early as possible, given pending action in Congress on a “fast track” trade promotion authority bill, said Neil Sroka, a spokesman for Democracy for America, the group founded by former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean
“There is no doubt that the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the fight over fast track is going to be part of the presidential election,” given the expectation that Clinton and others could declare their candidacy in April, the same month fast track could hit the Senate floor, Sroka said.
“It very well might be some of the first questions she is asked as a presidential candidate could be about TPP and fast track,” Sroka added. “There’s lots of reasons that people are excited about getting Elizabeth Warren into the presidential race, but her outspokenness in the battle against TPP … is something that speaks to the progressive base’s concerns and is attracting people to this campaign.”
Union groups, including the AFL-CIO labor federation, also have deep concerns about the prospective trade pact with Japan and 10 other countries in the Asia-Pacific that, along with the United States, represent more than 40 percent of world gross domestic product. They fear the deal will encourage companies to move more jobs overseas, suppressing wages in the United States.
Clinton, as Obama’s secretary of state, is closely associated with the agreement, which could grow to cover 21 economies in the region, including China. “Our hope is that a TPP agreement with high standards can serve as a benchmark for future agreements — and grow to serve as a platform for broader regional interaction and eventually a free trade area of the Asia-Pacific,” she wrote in October 2011.
The issue is front and center as Obama pushes for approval of trade promotion authority, a bill that would allow him to submit trade agreements, like the proposed TPP, to Congress for a straight up-or-down vote without any amendments. The next president, whoever it is, could also use the authority to negotiate a deal bringing China into the pact. Read Full Story POLITICO
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