Providing for Consideration of Senate Amendments to H.R. 2832, 3078, 3079, 3080

Floor Speech

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

Ms. DeLAURO. I rise in opposition to this rule and the trade agreements underlying it--particularly the agreement with Colombia. Nothing is more important to our economy right now than creating jobs and putting America back to work. And yet we have now before us three NAFTA-style trade agreements with South Korea, Colombia, and Panama that we know from experience will lead to more jobs being shipped overseas and greater trade deficits. In fact, the Economic Policy Institute has estimated this agreement with Colombia will result in the loss of 55,000 American jobs.

The Colombia deal is particularly galling because it will do more than just destroy American jobs. It will bring into question whether our Nation continues to be a defender of human rights and workers' rights around the world. According to the International Trade Union Confederation, more unionists are killed every year in Colombia than in the rest of the world combined. Last year saw 51 murders. As the AFL-CIO's Richard Trumka noted: ``If 51 CEOs had been murdered in Colombia last year, this deal would be on a very slow track indeed.''

This year, we have seen 23 more men and women killed. Human Rights Watch reviewed these and hundreds of other cases of antiunion violence there and concluded that Colombian authorities have ``made virtually no progress in obtaining convictions for killings from the past 4 1/2 years.''

In fact, in only 6 percent of the 2,860 trade unionist murders since 1986 have there been any convictions. That means 94 percent of the killers are walking away. Worse, 16 of the murders this year have occurred after the labor action plan put forward by the administration and the Colombian Government was put into effect.

This action plan is a fig leaf, pure and simple. It is not legally binding. It makes promises that the Colombian Government will step up its protections, but it demands no concrete results before this free trade agreement is implemented. According to the National Labor School, if Congress passes the free trade agreement, ``the limited willingness for change will be further reduced and the action plan will be turned into a new frustration for Colombian workers, in addition to causing other serious consequences.'' In other words, more violence--murders--against trade unionists will be just the cost of doing business.

We should not be sanctioning such a system of violence, terror, and abuse. We have a responsibility to protect the human rights defenders and working families in Colombia who are exercising, and only exercising, their fundamental rights. And we have a responsibility to stand up for our American working families who do not need to see any more good, well-paying jobs shipped overseas.

I urge my colleagues to oppose this rule and this unconscionable agreement.

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