Posted on 06/18/2015 10:38:37 AM PDT by SoConPubbie
I know this is probably moot for now, but I think it’s important that we have all the information. Cruz went to the trouble of putting this on his website today as a further explanation of his position on TPA/TPP to conservatives.
Here is the portion mentioned in the title:
Isn’t TPP a “living agreement”?
That particular phrase—a foolish and misleading way to put it—is found in the “summary” portion of one particular section of the draft agreement. That section allows member nations to amend the agreement in the future, expressly subject to the approval of their governments. Thus, if some amendment were proposed in the future, Congress would have to approve it before it went into effect.
The full document is below:
Senator Cruz entirely understands the widespread suspicion of the President. Nobody has been more vocal in pointing out the President’s lawlessness or more passionate about fighting his usurpation of congressional authority.
Senator Cruz would not and will not give President Obama one more inch of unrestricted power.
There have been a lot of questions and concerns about the ongoing Pacific trade negotiations. Many of those concerns, fueled by the media, stem from confusion about Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) and the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). Let’s unpack the issues one by one.
What are TPA and TPP?
TPA stands for Trade Promotion Authority, also known as “fast track”. TPA is a process by which trade agreements are approved by Congress. Through TPA, Congress sets out up-front objectives for the Executive branch to achieve in free trade negotiations; in exchange for following those objectives, Congress agrees to hold an up-or-down vote on trade agreements without amendments. For the past 80 years, it has proven virtually impossible to negotiate free-trade agreements without the fast-track process.TPP stands for Trans-Pacific Partnership. TPP is a specific trade agreement currently being negotiated by the United States and 11 other countries, including Canada, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand. China is not a negotiating partner. There is no final language on TPP because negotiations are still ongoing and have been since late 2009. Neither the Senate nor the House has voted yet on the TPP. There will be no vote on TPP until the negotiations are over and the final agreement is sent to Congress.
Some Key Facts:
- Neither the Senate nor the House has voted yet on the TPP.
- Congress is the only entity that can make U.S. law and nothing about TPP or TPA could change that.
- TPA gives the Congress more control up-front over free trade agreements.
- TPA mandates transparency by requiring all trade agreements (including TPP) to be made public for at least 60 days before the Congress can act on them.
Does TPA give up the Senate’s treaty power?
No. Under the Constitution, there are two ways to make binding law: (1) through a treaty, ratified by two-thirds of the Senate, or (2) through legislation passed by a majority of both Houses of Congress. TPA employs the second constitutional path, as trade bills always have done. It has long been recognized that the Constitution’s Origination Clause applies to trade bills, requiring the House of Representatives’ involvement.
Does the United States give up Sovereignty by entering into TPP?
No. Nothing in the agreement forces Congress to change any law. TPA explicitly provides that nothing in any trade agreement can change U.S. law. Congress is the only entity that can make U.S. law, and Congress is the only entity that can change U.S. law. Nothing about TPP or TPA could change that.
Does Senator Ted Cruz support TPP?
Senator Cruz has not taken a position either in favor or against TPP. He will wait until the agreement is finalized and he has a chance to study it carefully to ensure that the agreement will open more markets to American-made products, create jobs, and grow our economy. Senator Cruz has dedicated his professional career to defending U.S. sovereignty and the U.S. Constitution. He will not support any trade agreement that would diminish or undermine either.
Does Senator Ted Cruz support TPA?
Yes. Senator Cruz voted in favor of TPA earlier this year because it breaks the logjam that is preventing the U.S. from entering into trade deals that are good for American workers, American businesses, and our economy. Ronald Reagan emphatically supported free trade, and Senator Cruz does as well. He ran for Senate promising to support free trade, and he is honoring that commitment to the voters.Free trade helps American farmers, ranchers, and manufacturers; indeed, one in five American jobs depends on trade, in Texas alone 3 million jobs depend on trade. When we open up foreign markets, we create American jobs.
TPA also strengthens Congress’ hand in trade negotiations, and provides transparency by making the agreement (including TPP) public for at least 60 days before the Congress can act on any final agreement. Without TPA, there is no such transparency, and the Congress’ role in trade agreements is weaker.
Is TPA Constitutional?
TPA and similar trade authority has been upheld by the Supreme Court as constitutional for more than 100 years.
Does TPA give the President more authority?
No. TPA ensures that Congress has the ability to set the objectives up-front for free trade agreements.Trade Promotion Authority has been used to reduce trade barriers since FDR. When Harry Reid took over the Senate, he killed it. History demonstrates that it is almost impossible to negotiate a free-trade agreement without TPA. Right now without TPA, America is unable to negotiate free-trade agreements, putting the United States at a disadvantage to China, which is taking the lead world-wide. It is not in America’s interests to have China writing the rules of international trade.
Moreover, Obama is going to be president for just 18 more months. TPA is six-year legislation. If we want the next president (hopefully a Republican) to be able to negotiate free-trade agreements to restart our economy and create jobs here at home then we must reinstate TPA. With a Republican president in office, Senate Democrats would almost certainly vote party-line to block TPA, so now is the only realistic chance.
How can Senator Cruz trust Obama?
He doesn’t. Not at all. No part of Senator Cruz’s support for TPA was based on trusting Obama. However, under TPA, every trade deal is still subject to approval by Congress. If the Obama Administration tries to do something terrible in a trade agreement, Congress can vote it down. And most congressional Democrats will always vote no—because union bosses oppose free trade, so do most Democrats—which means a handful of conservative congressional Republicans have the votes to kill any bad deal. That’s a serious check on presidential power.
Isn’t TPP a “living agreement”?
That particular phrase—a foolish and misleading way to put it—is found in the “summary” portion of one particular section of the draft agreement. That section allows member nations to amend the agreement in the future, expressly subject to the approval of their governments. Thus, if some amendment were proposed in the future, Congress would have to approve it before it went into effect.
But isn’t TPA a secret agreement?
No, it is not. The full text of TPA (fast track) is public. What the Senate just voted for was TPA, not TPP.Right now, the text of TPP is classified. That is a mistake. Senator Cruz has vigorously called on the Obama administration to make the full text of TPP open to the public immediately. The text being hidden naturally only fuels concerns about what might be in it. Senator Cruz has read the current draft of TPP, and it should be made public now.
Critically, under TPA, TPP cannot be voted on until after the text has been public for 60 days. Therefore, everyone will be able to read it long before it comes up for a vote.
Couldn’t Obama use a trade agreement to grant amnesty to illegal immigrants?
No. There is one section of TPP that concerns immigration, but it affects only foreign nations—the United States has explicitly declined to sign on to that section.Moreover, Senator Cruz introduced a TPA amendment to expressly prohibit any trade deal from attempting to alter our immigration laws.
Two Republican Senators (Lindsey Graham and Rand Paul) blocked the Senate’s consideration of that amendment, but the House of Representatives has agreed to include that language in the final text of the trade legislation. Thus, assuming the House honors that public commitment, federal law will explicitly prohibit any trade deal from impacting immigration.
And, regardless, no trade agreement can change U.S. law; only Congress can change U.S. law.
I will not vote for Cruz, or any other candidate who supports TPP. It there is no choice other than that, I’ll just stay home.
And Ted Cruz cannot distance himself from any of its repercussions.
Hillary isn’t against it. She wrote it.
1) What he's saying is that TPA is like all the other trade bills since FDR, and that there have been a lot of them. This is broadly verifiable, since he says TPA is a public document. Can someone settle this?
2) Trade is good. Check that: Trade is essential. There is no development or wealth without it. Thomas Sowell has always told us so, and I believe him.
3) Freer trade is better trade. Pat Buchanan is wrong on this. Truly freer, that is: Not just freer for contributors to the party in power who want to import cheap stuff and let the regs entangle everyone else. That got us the Civil War, if you remember. But the key is that putting shackles on trade is putting shackles on innovation, competition, and ultimately on American prosperity. Example: For decades, we protected the auto unions in Detroit by keeping Japanese cars out of the country. All that did was remove incentives for Detroit to keep improving their cars. Finally, the restrictions and tariffs were lowered, and the Japanese cars came in—having developed in more competitive markets. They clobbered Detroit. Not just on price, but on design, performance, reliability, service, and INTELLIGENCE. Without protecting our lax and corrupt auto industry, our cars would have improved 35 years earlier, and we probably wouldn't have lost that whole city in the meantime.
4) Does the vote on TPA truly function as a cloture vote on TPP? I'd like to see confirmation of this. Has anyone asked the Senator this, and has he responded, or refused to respond? Is TPP genuinely unbeatable by anything short of a hurricane making landfall in the District, no matter how bad the bill is? Can someone truly demonstrate this? So far, I haven't seen Cruz make empty claims, which that would imply. But I would consider evidence. As I read them, the responses cited are logical and clear, and consistent with what I know.
The main collision here seems to be between the free trade view and the tariff view of the world—which is the Democrats' turf. That's where your goal is to pass special tariffs to protect your friends and contributors—as opposed to a free-for-all that rewards innovation. My read of history is that the latter system is more just and involves less government interference, and embodies what has made America succeed.
Agreed.
So you have no problem with the fact that our legislatures are not writing these laws and are not ammending these laws. Answer the question. Who is writing them ? We want names and affiliations.
China and India are not included in TPP.
What part of *ANYONE* is unclear?
I will not vote for, or support anyone who supports this bill. Period.
Anyone supporting this should be hung. Slowly, and buried outside of the USA.
Bttt
Still support Cruz myself. As corrupt as this government has become, he will be the best they will ever allow us to get. Short of a revolution.
Have you read it? Are they included in some back door clause or as part of a trade agreement they have with one of the signing countries?
I thought the whole agreement was top secret. Do you have an inside source?
Well, yes, gotta hand it to you there!
Of course she was *for* it when she wrote it, but now she is *against* it, after writing it, until she is *for* it again after writing it and being *against* it after she was *for* it. Hillary is a perfect bobble head.
:)
Think of it this way.
The TPA (rules of passing trade agreements, agreements, treaties, etc...) just cut the debate time in congress to ONLY 60 days from unlimited time. Congress did this in order to RAM through Obama-Trade legislation before anyone has enough time to vet it out. That way the congress along with the controlled media can call anyone “conspiracy theorist” for being “skeptical” as our Founding Fathers encouraged us to be about any new draconian trade legislation/agreements.
It also lowered the vote threshold in congress to pass a trade agreement, agreement, treaty, etc...to 51% from 2/3rds that had been in our country for over 200 years. Bottom line this makes it easier to BRIBE CONGRESS since it requires less people to bribe.
Cruz, Boehner and McConnell were more than orgasmiclly excited to give the Administration even more power. This is even though last November the Republicans were elected to stop the Administration. Now the MAJORITY OF THE REPUBLICANS IN CONGRESS have showed their true colors.
When you hear the words “Free Trade” today think this means the United States IS THE ONLY COUNTRY THAT PAYS TARIFFS while the countries DO NOT PAY TARIFFS.
It’s just like in the book 1984 where they “War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery and Ignorance is Strength”. Everything is turn on its head. It’s the opposite of what it says. For instance, the “Affordable Care Act” (aka Obamacare) is anything but affordable. The “Patriot Act” that was used to illegally target all Americans, instead of real terrorist via the NSA scandal, is anything but patriotic. We were lied too and no one went to prison. It’s all a giant scam.
Anyhow, the Trans Pacific Partnership (aka the TPP) is a trade agreement that is being hidden from the public. How is that for transparency? Although parts of it has been leaking out.
The TPP will ENCOURAGE COMPANIES TO LEAVE the United States. That way they can avoid paying Tariffs, have less regulation, less taxes and a cheaper slave labor. If companies want to stay here, will still have to pay Tariffs, taxed and regulated out of business. Just as Obama promised to do to the Coal industry.
Think about it this way. During the second world war our main attack was on German industry, factories, energy companies, etc. THAT.... is what is slowly happening to the United States today. These are completely rigged trade deals (since we pay tariffs and the countries we have agreements with do not) that has been eroding our Republic since 1996.
Think of it this way too. Prior to NAFTA in 1996 we were the World’s ONLY true Super Power. We had been that way for 50 years since World War II. That’s was also before we had any of these rigged trade agreements. The country ran just fine. We had our issues, but it was not like this now.
Oh the trade is only a small part of the TPP. There is additional draconian legislation where foreign communist countries will have more power than our congress. So expect carbon taxes and a gun legislation via the trade bill. This is the stealth way the Administration gets around congress, the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
This is why Obama was pushing so hard for this, and the Republicans like Boehner, McConnell and Cruz were more than happy to help him instead of blocking.
This is horrible for the United States, but many of these Republicans are going to keep trying to bamboozle the gullible American public.
The twelve countries involved in TPP are, Australia, Brunia Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand,, Peru, Singapore, Vietnam, USA.
My objection (hanging together here) is not the favorable history of trade agreements of yesterday, nor even the moving target of the contents, nor is it even the process of these two bills. It’s the TIMING and it’s OBAMA. Period.
I don’t want to see his signature on anything for fifteen months. I don’t want to hear his voice on issues for fifteen months. I want him frozen in place as near as that is made possible, for fifteen months.
Yesterday is gone, as Rubio said. Trust is dead. Our government is corrupt. We have evidence! :)
You pretty much need "fast track" in order to get any negotiated treaty passed, because you can't have a finished treaty be amended by congress, since that would require that version to be resubmitted back to the treaty partners for approval.
That said, it doesn't remove the Constitutional necessity of having a 2/3 majority to approve them.
Calling them "trade agreements" to get around the 2/3 requirements rather than simply having up/down votes on them as treaties is dishonest. Of course anyone who looks for honesty from our government is a fool who will ultimately be disappointed. Our feral government will do what it wants, when it wants to get what will most quickly enrich the oligarchy.
I think Cruz would have done better to have fought this from the perspective of this undermining of Constitutional authority. That would put him clearly on the side of supporting a 'fast track' provision for treaty negotiations, while at the same time opposing this particular legislation because it undermines the Constitution and the Senate's advice and consent powers/requirements.
Reject it?? He’s already voted for it by voting for TPA! Anything that happens now is theater. Wake up people we continue to get played. This only gets fixed by getting rid of every single federal employee regardless of what party they supposedly represent.
Like Mark Levin said..why give fast track to Obama when he is not for free trade? Why not wait until we have a president we can trust. What is the hurry?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.