[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 140 (Tuesday, September 20, 2011)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5763-S5764]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




       EXTENDING THE GENERALIZED SYSTEM OF PREFERENCES--Continued

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Montana.
  Mr. BAUCUS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that there be 2 
minutes equally divided prior to the next vote.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Republican leader.


                           Amendment No. 626

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, my amendment on which we are about to 
vote would grant to the President something no President has had since 
trade promotion authority expired back in 2007. Without trade promotion 
authority, there will be no other trade agreements. We all know that. 
If America wants to be the leader of the world in trade, we have to 
have trade agreements.
  What I have done here is offered trade promotion authority--what we 
used to call fast-track--as an amendment to trade adjustment 
assistance. They have been historically linked going back to 1974. I 
think it is a big mistake for our country, even if we provide trade 
adjustment assistance, to just operate as if there are not going to be 
any more trade agreements in the United States. We used to be the 
leader in world trade.
  My party does not occupy the White House. I want the President of the 
United States, whoever that is, to have trade promotion authority 
because I would like to see us have an opportunity to have trade 
agreements in the future. All of our competitors have taken advantage 
of the fact that we have not had a trade agreement for years.
  These three agreements were actually negotiated by the previous 
administration. So if we would like for this President or the next 
President--because this would extend TPA to the end of 2013, so it will 
grant this authority to the next President, whoever that is, in 
addition to this President--if my colleagues think we ought to have 
another trade agreement sometime in the future for the United States of 
America, I urge them to support my amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Montana.
  Mr. BAUCUS. Mr. President, I agree with much of what the minority 
leader said. I very much believe we should negotiate free-trade 
agreements with other countries. I think we are behind the curve. Other 
countries are negotiating. We are being left behind. We should 
negotiate agreements that are good agreements.
  The amendment offered by the Senator from Kentucky, however, is the 
2002 version. A lot has changed in the last 10 years. There are 
environmental provisions, labor, and China is very much a competitor. I 
think it would be unwise to extend TPA because there are changes in the 
world today that this version does not reflect. It has to be updated to 
the current times.
  Second, if this amendment would pass, then we wouldn't be getting 
free-trade agreements. The Speaker has made it very clear he wants a 
clean bill and then he will take up TAA--this bill--which many of us 
support by a large margin, and then he will take up the free-trade 
agreements. So if this body wants TAA and wants the FTAs, we have to 
vote against this amendment at this time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to amendment No. 
626, as modified, offered by the Senator from Kentucky, Mr. McConnell.
  Mr. McCONNELL. I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second? There appears to 
be a sufficient second.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk called the roll.
  The result was announced--yeas 45, nays 55, as follows:

[[Page S5764]]

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 141 Leg.]

                                YEAS--45

     Alexander
     Ayotte
     Barrasso
     Blunt
     Boozman
     Brown (MA)
     Burr
     Chambliss
     Coats
     Coburn
     Cochran
     Corker
     Cornyn
     Crapo
     DeMint
     Enzi
     Grassley
     Hatch
     Heller
     Hoeven
     Hutchison
     Inhofe
     Isakson
     Johanns
     Johnson (WI)
     Kirk
     Kyl
     Lee
     Lieberman
     Lugar
     McCain
     McConnell
     Moran
     Murkowski
     Portman
     Pryor
     Risch
     Roberts
     Rubio
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Thune
     Toomey
     Vitter
     Wicker

                                NAYS--55

     Akaka
     Baucus
     Begich
     Bennet
     Bingaman
     Blumenthal
     Boxer
     Brown (OH)
     Cantwell
     Cardin
     Carper
     Casey
     Collins
     Conrad
     Coons
     Durbin
     Feinstein
     Franken
     Gillibrand
     Graham
     Hagan
     Harkin
     Inouye
     Johnson (SD)
     Kerry
     Klobuchar
     Kohl
     Landrieu
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Levin
     Manchin
     McCaskill
     Menendez
     Merkley
     Mikulski
     Murray
     Nelson (NE)
     Nelson (FL)
     Paul
     Reed
     Reid
     Rockefeller
     Sanders
     Schumer
     Shaheen
     Snowe
     Stabenow
     Tester
     Udall (CO)
     Udall (NM)
     Warner
     Webb
     Whitehouse
     Wyden
  The amendment (No. 626), as modified, was rejected.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Bennet). On this vote, the yeas are 45, 
the nays are 55. Under the previous order requiring 60 votes for the 
adoption of this amendment, the amendment is rejected.
  Mr. BAUCUS. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. GRASSLEY. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa.
  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I wish to address the Senate for about 6 
or 7 minutes on a trade issue that normally I would be offering an 
amendment on. I am not going to offer an amendment during this debate 
because I think it is very important we move forward with this 
legislation so, hopefully, the President will stop moving the goalposts 
and send to the Senate Panama, Colombia, and South Korea.
  But the reason I address the issue of the general system of 
preferences is because, quite frankly, I am sick and tired of a lot of 
nations--that may not be considered developed yet but advanced very 
rapidly in the last 20 years--taking advantage of our GSP system. I do 
not mind them taking advantage of our GSP system, but what irritates me 
is a lot of times in WTO negotiations, they are the very same countries 
that are finding fault with the United States and Europe not giving 
enough on agricultural issues, as an example, at the very same time 
these countries have very high tariffs on our products getting into 
their country, when they get, under GSP, their products into our 
country duty free.
  So, Mr. President, I want you to know I appreciate the fact we are 
finally debating the merits of trade legislation.
  Most people agree that one way we can help our economy is by opening 
and expanding markets for American-made products. I look forward to the 
President, as I just said, sending us the free-trade agreements. In the 
meantime, much of the discussion has centered on the bill before us, 
the GSP and the Trade Adjustment Assistance Program.
  While it is important for us to have a discussion on the merits of 
TAA, I do not want my colleagues to overlook the significance of the 
underlying bill. This bill extends the general system of preferences. 
This program provides one-way--and I want to emphasize--duty-free 
access to U.S. markets. So over a period of several decades, we have 
been awfully good to a lot of countries that we think we ought to help 
and we have been helping.
  The basic principle, then, behind the GSP is to provide certain goods 
made in developing countries with preferential market access to the 
United States in the form of this duty-free status. The intention is to 
help spur economic growth in developing nations.
  I support the premise that we can help developing countries by 
promoting trade. But I can also tell you that our patience is getting 
very thin with some of those countries, particularly when we see them 
not reciprocating in a way that they have the capability of 
reciprocating. Our trade relations, however, should increasingly be 
based upon reciprocity by which other countries will provide the same 
open access to U.S. exports. In other words, as those countries become 
more developed, we need to require that they move toward operating on a 
level playing field with the United States.
  Congress needs to take, then, a hard look at GSP and scrutinize 
whether it is helping accomplish the U.S. trade agenda. I think we 
would find some of these countries coming up short. In another 
environment of discussing trade, I would be taking a different 
approach: that we would send a clear signal to some of these countries 
of our impatience, and they are going to have to graduate off GSP. If 
other nations believe they will always enjoy GSP, then what incentives 
do they have to open their markets to U.S. goods? That is why we ought 
to very much advance the system of graduating off GSP with some of 
those countries.
  There are nations that benefit from GSP that, quite frankly, have 
moved beyond what I consider to be developing countries. I continue to 
question why we provide preferential treatment at all to the products 
from countries such as Brazil and India. These countries have at times 
worked against the trade interests of the United States, including 
resistance to reducing high tariffs on U.S. exports. Both of these 
countries have countless products competing in the global market with 
U.S. products.
  I am not offering an amendment, as I have already said, to this GSP 
bill, not because I do not think my position is good but because I want 
to see the pending trade agreements submitted and approved by the 
Congress. I am not interested in raising any barriers that make that 
task more difficult than the President has already made it.
  However, I will continue to push for reform of GSP. I urge my 
colleagues to take a close look at this program and consider the points 
I have raised in the past and I am raising right now but not raising in 
the form of an amendment that ought to be offered at this time.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Louisiana.

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