Providing For Consideration of H.R. 2596, Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2016

Floor Speech

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, the vote on Trade Adjustment Assistance failed in the House of Representatives last Friday by a 3-1 margin; yet this rule today would extend the revote on Trade Adjustment Assistance through the end of July. This is one more attempt to play games with the future of hard-working families.

American workers demand and they deserve respect. They deserve a living wage and the right not to have their jobs shipped overseas. That is what we are united in fighting for.

A vote for this rule is a vote for fast track. A vote for fast track is a vote against jobs and against wages.

United States trade policy has been failing American workers, failing American consumers and families for 20 years.

The U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement has already cost up to 75,000 jobs, and it was just passed 3 years ago. Up to 5 million jobs have been destroyed by currency manipulation; and a number of the signatories to this trade agreement, their policy is to manipulate their currency to have their goods sold at a lower price than American goods, putting American workers out of jobs and lowering their wages.

Joseph Stiglitz, the Nobel Laureate in Economics, has written: ``Inequality is not inevitable. It is a choice that we make with the rules that we create to structure our economy.''

Trade policy is one of those choices. If we approve fast track, we throw away our ability, our constitutional authority to represent the people who sent us here in good faith. We throw away that ability to be able to fix the flaws in the trade agreement, like the Trans-Pacific Partnership, to the detriment of millions of American families.

I urge a ``no'' vote on this rule.

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