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The Senate on Tuesday voted to advance President Obama’s trade agenda, approving a measure to end debate on fast-track authority. The 60-37 motion sets up a vote on final passage on Wednesday. If the Senate approves fast-track or trade promotion authority (TPA), it would then be sent to Obama’s desk to become law. Fast-track authority would allow Obama to send trade deals to Congress for up-or-down votes. The White House wants the authority to conclude negotiations on a sweeping trans-Pacific trade deal. Thirteen Democrats backed fast-track in Tuesday’s vote, handing Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) a major legislative victory....

The Senate is set to vote on the Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) legislation the House passed last week that gives President Obama fast track trade authority to finalize his trade negotiations without Congressional amendments. Right now, Obama is finalizing negotiations on the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP), Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), and the Trade in Services Agreement (TiSA). Under fast-track trade authority, Congress only gets an up or down vote on the final negotiation, and is not part of the negotiating process. The legislation passed the House because it did not contain TAA – Trade Adjustment Assistance – a...

With the House poised to reconsider Trade Promotion Authority [TPA] as a stand alone measure as early as Thursday, House Speaker Rep. John Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Sen. Mitch McConnell reaffirmed their focus on achieving a key aspect of Obama’s trade agenda. “We are committed to ensuring both TPA and [Trade Adjustment Assistance] get votes in the House and Senate and are sent to the President for signature,” the pair said in a joint statement Wednesday afternoon. “And it is our intent to have a conference on the customs bill and complete that in a timely manner so that...

Republican leaders will try to resurrect the trade deal Democrats sank less than a week ago, planning a new vote Thursday and insisting they will corral enough votes to approve fast-track negotiating powers President Obama needs to complete a legacy-building Pacific Rim trade deal...“We are committed to ensuring both TPA and TAA get votes in the House and Senate and are sent to the president for signature,” House Speaker John A. Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said in a joint statement, pushing back against claims that the issue is dead after last week’s embarrassing failure...The White House has...

Dropping Trade Adjustment Assistance risks losing Democratic support for the larger trade deal. The House is on the brink of scheduling a standalone vote on giving President Barack Obama fast-track trade authority without accompanying worker assistance legislation, according to multiple sources familiar with the plan. The House could vote on Trade Promotion Authority as early as this week, the sources said. The House Rules Committee, which sets parameters for the consideration of legislation, meets late Tuesday afternoon. A final decision has not been made, and top Congressional aides are in negotiations to chart a course forward. Boehner was set to...

After talks with President Barack Obama, top Republican leaders in Congress put together a quick rescue plan Tuesday for highly controversial, White House-backed trade legislation that derailed in the House last week. Officials said House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., were likely to split the stalled bill into two parts in hopes of sending them to the president separately, with Republicans providing most of the needed votes for one part, and Democrats for the other. The first would consist of stand-alone legislation strengthening Obama's hand in global trade talks by giving Congress the right...

 In an indication of just how desperate the Republican establishment and their Big Business paymasters are to revive the package of fast track Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) and Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) bills that went down last week, the House Rules Committee slipped the rule for reconsideration of the failed TAA bill into the rule for H.R. 2596, the Fiscal Year 2016 Intelligence Authorization bill.Along with the National Defense Authorization bill, the Intel Authorization bill is considered to be one of the “must pass” bills of each legislative year.According to the existing Rules, the Motion to Reconsider the vote on...

A lot of misinformation is being spread about Trade Promotion Authority or TPA that is currently being debated in Congress. First and foremost I want to tell you why I support TPA and why I think it's an important step forward for not only West Michigan but the entire country. The Constitution lays out specific roles for both the President as well as Congress in terms of trade. The President's role is to negotiate with foreign counties on behalf of the United States, while the role of Congress is to review any potential trade agreement and then vote to either...

The abbreviations are flying fast and furious, and it can be hard to keep up. Here’s a guide to where we’re at. The House just had two key votes. First, there was a vote on Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA), a big old subsidy program for unions. Unions love it, but Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) 18% pulled support for it as a ploy. So after TAA (union subsidy) failed, the House voted on Trade Promotion Authority (TPA, more commonly known as Fast Track). Without TAA (union subsidy) included, most Republicans were on board, and most Democrats were opposed. Since Republican have...

U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) warns: It appears there will be another attempt by Tuesday to force through new executive powers for President Obama. A vote for TAA next week is a vote to send fast-track to the President’s desk and to grant him these broad new executive authorities. If that happens, it will empower the President to form a Pacific Union encompassing 40 percent of the world’s economy and 12 nations—each with one equal vote. ... Fast-track will not only apply to the Pacific Union, but can expedite an unlimited number of yet-unseen international compacts for six years. There...

President Barack Obama’s trade agenda is running into potentially fatal opposition within his own party on the eve of a critical vote, and there might be only one person who can save it: Obama himself. Speaker John Boehner’s plan to bring a package of trade bills to the House floor Friday is proving to be a big gamble, as both senior Republicans and Democrats are privately wondering whether they have the votes to pass several key portions. The most pressing concern is over Trade Adjustment Assistance, a program to retrain workers who lose their jobs to free trade. The initiative...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Nearly a dozen Republican senators on Wednesday urged President Barack Obama to quickly send Congress three long-delayed trade deals that they said would help put Americans back to work. "If the president really cares about jobs, he will send up the agreements immediately," Senator Rob Portman told reporters, referring to deals with South Korea, Panama and Colombia signed more than four years ago. With Obama set to outline his ideas for reducing high U.S. unemployment in a speech on Thursday night, Senator Mike Johanns urged the president to announce that he will send the pacts to Congress...

WASHINGTON — U.S. fighter planes intercepted two Russian bombers flying unusually close to an American aircraft carrier in the western Pacific during the weekend, The Associated Press has learned. A U.S. military official says that one Russian Tupolev 95 buzzed the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz twice, at a low altitude of about 2,000 feet, while another bomber circled about 50 nautical miles out. The official was speaking on condition of anonymity because the reports on the flights were classified as secret.

It has been almost two years since 9/11 and yet recent news headlines warn "Al Qaeda May Be Planning More Hijack Attacks." Unfortunately, our air-travel system is still very vulnerable to hijacking, and quick measures need to be taken. Another successful attack would make it very difficult to again restore travelers' faith in security. Last week, pilots from around the country held rallies in Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, Miami, and Washington, D.C. to draw attention to their concerns. Consider the following: Pilots claim that while at least one third of flights out of Washington's Reagan National are covered with...

Give Tom Daschle this much: Even in a city of spinners and parsers, the Senate Majority Leader is uniquely difficult to understand. He's attacked President Bush for cutting taxes too much, yet would not repeal the cuts. One day he questions the President's anti-terrorism strategy as lacking "a clear direction." Another day he's wholeheartedly on board. But none of the South Dakota Democrat's positions is more confusing than his stance on granting the president fast track trade negotiating authority. Throughout his career, and especially during the Clinton years, Daschle strongly supported the fruits of past fast track bills - the...