[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 128 (Thursday, September 20, 2012)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6526-S6527]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      50TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE USTR

  Mr. BAUCUS. Mr. President, William Shakespeare once said, ``Nimble 
thought can jump both sea and land.''
  Today I wish to pay tribute to a U.S. Government agency whose 
thinking is nimble and its actions as well. The Office of the U.S. 
Trade Representative is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year.
  For 50 years, USTR's small but elite staff has been crossing the 
globe, over sea and land, to break down barriers to American exports, 
and they have helped develop a world linked by trade, a world governed 
by rules, to ensure a level playing field for our exporters and their 
workers.
  USTR has been remarkably effective at that task. Since the creation 
of the Special Trade Representative in 1962, annual U.S. trade has 
grown from $52.1 billion to $4.8 trillion, contributing to economic 
growth of nearly 350 percent. USTR led the way through 20 FTA 
negotiations, multiple GATT and WTO Rounds, and countless bilateral 
trade negotiations in its quest to create opportunities abroad for U.S. 
businesses, workers, farmers and ranchers, in order to reach the 95 
percent of global consumers who live outside the United States.
  USTR spearheaded the effort to create the fundamental rules and 
structures that underpin the global trading system. It successfully 
concluded the Uruguay Round negotiations that created the World Trade 
Organization. The WTO contributed to an explosion of trade and extended 
the rules-based trading system to nearly every trading nation of the 
world.
  Throughout it all, the dedicated officials at USTR have maintained 
their commitment to expanding economic growth through trade, for the 
benefit of all Americans. Through Democratic and Republican 
administrations, USTR officials have put the interests of all Americans 
first. And they have accomplished so much with so little. Never larger 
than its current strength of about 250 professionals, USTR has turned 
its small size into a virtue. USTR acts and reacts quickly, cutting 
through bureaucratic obstacles in the government to develop and execute 
market-opening strategies to break down barriers facing American 
exporters abroad.
  As part of the Executive Office of the President, USTR is perfectly 
positioned to leverage the resources of the entire U.S. government and 
to integrate the full range of stakeholder interests on trade issues. 
And it is perfectly positioned, and has served well, as an effective 
and indispensable interlocutor with the U.S. Congress. USTR understands 
and respects Congress's constitutionally established role in the 
regulation of international trade. Through its close consultations with 
Capitol Hill, USTR presents to the world a trade policy that enjoys 
broad support.
  USTR would not be as effective and it could not perform its role if 
housed elsewhere in the government or were it to become much larger and 
more bureaucratic. As others have observed over the years, if USTR did 
not exist in its current form, it would have to be reinvented.

[[Page S6527]]

  USTR is now hard at work on a number of initiatives that continue its 
legacy of expanding trade for the benefit of all Americans, such as the 
Trans-Pacific Partnership, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, 
and World Trade Organization agreements on topics from services 
liberalization to customs reform. And USTR remains hard at work 
enforcing our existing trade agreements at the WTO and elsewhere, to 
ensure the United States receives the full benefit of those agreements.
  So I would like to extend my congratulations to Ambassador Kirk, his 
predecessors, and the entire USTR team past and present for reaching 
the 50-year milestone. I look forward to another half century of 
stellar accomplishments, and I can assure you that I will do everything 
I can to help make that possible.

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