[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 121 (Wednesday, July 18, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5029-S5031]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                                Tariffs

  Mr. JONES. Mr. President, I rise to discuss an issue that is of great 
importance to my constituents in Alabama and to many other people 
across the country. At issue is the health of our automotive industry.
  Unfortunately, the health of my State's automobile industry is being 
threatened not by unfair competition or illegal practices but by 
significant tariffs proposed by the President. According to the U.S. 
Chamber of Commerce, more than a half a million Alabama jobs are 
supported by global trade, meaning more than one in every four Alabama 
jobs is tied to trade.
  One of the key reasons Alabama has such a robust trade posture is due 
to our automotive manufacturing industry. I am old enough to remember 
what it was like before auto companies came to Alabama in the 1990s, 
starting with Mercedes. At the time that Mercedes came, many of 
Alabama's manufacturing facilities were closing down and moving to 
other countries. Yet, one by one--from Mercedes, to Honda, to Hyundai, 
and now to Toyota and Mazda, which are breaking ground on a new plant 
very soon--these automakers came to Alabama and breathed new life into 
our State's economy. They support, today, some 57,000 Alabama jobs, and 
our auto exports topped $11 billion in 2017. That doesn't even include 
the new Toyota-Mazda plant in Huntsville, which is going to add another 
4,000 jobs and $1.6 billion in economic development.
  After having no automobile industry 30 years ago, Alabama has become 
the third largest exporter of automobiles in this country. In only the 
past 15 months, every major automobile manufacturer in Alabama has 
announced an expansion to total 5,400 jobs and $3.3 billion in 
investments. This industry has been a phenomenal success in Alabama 
and, more importantly, for the men and women who rely on these very 
good-paying jobs to support their families and to build better lives.
  That is why it is a priority for me and colleagues like my friend, 
Senator Alexander from Tennessee, to keep our States' automotive 
industry thriving. Yet, recently, this industry has come under attack. 
In May, President Trump threatened a 25-percent tariff

[[Page S5030]]

on imported cars, trucks, and auto parts under the pretext that these 
products somehow threaten our national security.
  Let me be clear. While the United States faces any number of threats 
from adversaries on any number of fronts, foreign automobiles and auto 
parts are not threats to our national security. Do you know what is a 
threat? It is a 25-percent tax on the prices of these imported goods. 
The President's proposed auto tariffs have the potential to inflict 
serious damage on a booming industry in my State and in other leading 
auto-producing States, like Tennessee. We might call it a tariff, but 
we all know exactly what it is--a tax.
  By definition, a tariff is a tax on a particular class of imports or 
exports. Any tariffs placed on products that come into the United 
States are taxes that increase the cost of those goods to American 
consumers. When other countries place additional tariffs, or new taxes, 
on American goods, it raises the purchase prices of American products 
overseas and hurts our ability to sustain competitive markets in those 
countries. So it is deeply troubling that the recent proposal from the 
President will threaten tens of thousands of jobs in Alabama and 
increase costs for American consumers.
  Shortly after this tariff threat was issued, Senator Alexander joined 
me in writing to Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, and we urged him to 
reconsider the auto tariff tax proposal. Between our two States, the 
automotive sector contributes more than 200,000 jobs to our economies. 
Numbers of autoworkers from our States are in town this week to tell 
their stories, firsthand, to the Commerce Department, and I commend 
them for their efforts in doing so.
  Senator Alexander and I understand the devastating blow these tariffs 
will represent to an industry that has literally rebuilt our respective 
States' economies from the ground up. Automakers and their suppliers 
can be found in every corner and in nearly every county of each of our 
States. We have found common cause in fighting these tariffs and 
protecting our constituents from the devastating impacts they will 
have.
  There are already a few legislative solutions out there, including 
Senator Corker's solution regarding tariffs. I know Senator Portman is 
also doing a lot of good work in this space. Senator Alexander and I 
are working together to propose a solution of our own as a 
complementary measure to halt these tariffs. We hope to introduce that 
proposal as early as next week after consulting with our automotive 
manufacturers and working with our colleagues to grow bipartisan 
support for this legislation.
  I realize that folks who have been affected by these proposed tariffs 
are looking for a silver bullet to stop them dead in their tracks. 
Right now, the only silver bullet in this case is for the President to 
change his mind and recognize how many jobs are at risk because of 
these proposed tariffs. Until that happens, we are going to fight to 
protect what our States and our workers have earned.

  I want to thank my colleague Senator Alexander, who is here today, 
for his continued partnership in this effort. I look forward to working 
with more of our colleagues to stop the urgent threat to American jobs.
  Thank you.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I want to thank the Senator from 
Alabama for his remarks.
  I come to the floor to discuss bipartisan legislation that he and I, 
as he said, plan to introduce as soon as next week to encourage the 
Trump administration to reconsider the dangerous steps it is taking to 
impose tariffs on imported automobiles and automotive parts.
  I use the word ``dangerous'' because nothing has done more during the 
last 40 years to raise family incomes in Tennessee than the arrival of 
the auto industry, and nothing could do more damage to those family 
incomes than the proposed tariffs on imported automobiles and 
automotive parts, combined with the tariffs on imported steel and 
aluminum that the administration has already imposed.
  We have heard the Senator from Alabama talk about his State. In my 
view, Tennessee is more likely to be hurt than any other State by these 
tariffs. Let me tell a short story to explain why I would make such a 
dramatic statement.
  Forty years ago, I walked 1,000 miles across Tennessee in my campaign 
for Governor. In Rutherford County, outside Nashville, I spent the 
night with the Knight family. Mrs. Knight told me that her twin boys 
were bright but that she was sad because, as she put it, there are no 
jobs around here. She said: They are smart boys, and they will never 
get a job here, and I will never see my grandchildren.
  Forty years ago, there were no auto jobs in Tennessee. We were the 
third poorest State. Our family incomes were the third lowest. Our low-
paying textile jobs were fleeing outside of our country. Unemployment 
and inflation were high, and prospects were bleak. Then in 1980--just 2 
years after that walk, when I was the Governor of Tennessee--Nissan 
from Japan arrived and came to Rutherford. Then General Motors, with 
Saturn, came to Spring Hill. Then Volkswagen came to Chattanooga. All 
had large manufacturing plants.
  As the American automobile industry moved to the Southeastern United 
States, more than 900 auto part suppliers spread across 88 of 
Tennessee's 95 counties. Today, 136,000 Tennesseans--or one-third of 
our manufacturing workforce--work in those auto plants. Those auto jobs 
have become the main driver of family incomes, which have now risen to 
a little above the national average. Our economy is booming, and 
unemployment is at a record low.
  Today, Tennessee produces 6.7 percent of all of the cars and trucks 
produced in the United States. Tennessee exported more than $5.5 
billion worth of automobiles and auto parts last year. Tennessee has 
been the top State in auto manufacturing strength for 5 out of the last 
8 years, according to Business Facilities.
  Let me get back to my little story. Last year, one of those bright 
twins from Rutherford County--the Knight family--where I spent the 
night 40 years ago, Randy Knight, retired as the general manager of the 
Nissan plant, which is the largest and most efficient auto plant in 
North America. His brother works there, too, and so does one of those 
grandchildren whom the grandmother thought she would never see.
  You can see why Tennesseans become very worried when anything 
threatens the auto industry that has transformed our State. Here is why 
the proposed tariffs do that.
  As the Senator from Alabama said, tariffs are taxes. Tariffs are 
taxes on us, pure and simple. They make what we buy and sell more 
expensive. The laws of economics usually say that when you make what 
you buy and sell more expensive, you buy and sell less of it. If we 
sell fewer automobiles and automotive parts, there will be lower 
revenues, lower profits, fewer wage increases, and fewer jobs.
  Since almost every one of the 900 auto part suppliers use steel and 
aluminum, lower revenues and smaller profits mean fewer wage increases 
and fewer jobs for the 136,000 Tennesseans who work in the more than 
900 auto plants in our State. More expensive cars means fewer people in 
the United States buy those cars and fewer people overseas buy those 
cars--the cars we make. Fewer people buying cars and trucks means that 
136,000 Tennesseans in America's No. 1 auto State are going to have a 
lower standard of living than they otherwise would and lower family 
incomes.
  Why in the world would our government raise our taxes and destroy our 
jobs in this way? Well, the government's answer is that tariffs protect 
jobs in the steel and aluminum industry.
  It is true that some steel and aluminum jobs might be saved, but in 
2003, when President George W. Bush proposed steel tariffs, there were 
about 10 times as many people working in the steel-using industries as 
there were in steel-producing industries. Let me say that again. There 
were more people working in the steel-using industry than there were in 
the steel-producing industry.
  President Bush dropped the idea after a year because the tariffs 
destroyed, as

[[Page S5031]]

I said, more jobs in other industries, including the automotive 
industry, than they saved in the steel-producing industry.
  I know something about the aluminum industry. My dad worked most of 
his life at Alcoa's Tennessee aluminum smelting plant, which closed a 
few years ago because electricity was so much cheaper in other parts of 
the world. You use electricity--lots of it--to smelt aluminum. That is 
why those plants came to East Tennessee more than a century ago. But 
electric prices in the United States gradually rose over that century, 
and are still cheaper in other parts of the world. So today there are 
only eight smelting plants left in the United States. Seven of them are 
still in operation. Alcoa operates four and makes 46 percent--nearly 
half--of all of the aluminum produced in the United States. Alcoa 
opposes the aluminum tariffs because it also operates smelting plants 
in Canada and other countries that export aluminum to the United 
States.
  The bottom line is this: The largest U.S. producer of aluminum, 
Alcoa, doesn't want the aluminum tariffs. The thousands of auto plants 
and other plants that use aluminum don't want the aluminum tariffs. So 
who is asking for the aluminum tariffs?
  A second reason justifying tariffs is that other countries may have 
been unfair to the United States. There may be examples of that, but 
when did it become a good idea to solve your own problem by shooting 
yourself in both feet at once? It is hard to see how raising our taxes 
and destroying our jobs is a smart solution to unfair trade practices.
  Then there is the question of whether tariffs help autoworkers. 
Raising taxes and prices and selling fewer cars wouldn't seem to help 
the American autoworker.
  Will it cause foreign companies to build more cars in the United 
States? Well, that is already happening.
  The foreign manufacturers have been doing exactly what we asked them 
to do. They have moved here. They produce cars and trucks here. They 
export many of those cars and trucks and auto parts to other countries. 
Today, about half the cars being built in America are being built by 
the so-called foreign manufacturers. Nissan's plant in Rutherford 
County employs 8,000 Tennesseans and is the largest and most efficient 
auto plant in North America.
  I was with President Trump last year when he spoke in Michigan about 
all the autoworker jobs leaving the Midwest. Since 1994, 3.6 million of 
those jobs have left the Midwest, but they didn't go overseas; they 
moved to Tennessee and Alabama and other parts of the Southeastern 
United States, which gained 3.6 million auto jobs during the same 
period. Those new auto plants are in Tennessee, Alabama, Georgia, 
Mississippi, South Carolina, Kentucky, and Texas. Those are all States 
where the President is widely admired and States that he carried 
heavily in his election effort.
  Those plants moved primarily to the Southeast because our part of the 
country offered right-to-work laws and an environment that allowed 
companies to make quality cars at a lower cost and sell them 
competitively here in the United States and around the world. In fact, 
my own view is that the movement of the American auto industry to the 
Southeast saved the American auto industry because where it was 25, 30, 
or 40 years ago was stuck in the Midwest in an oligopoly where the 
United Automobile Workers and three big companies were producing big, 
expensive cars, and the little foreign cars were coming in and eating 
their lunch in the marketplace. So now we have strong and effective 
American auto plants in the Midwestern United States and in the 
Southeastern United States, and half of them are made by so-called 
foreign manufacturers.
  I agree with President Trump on many things--taxes, judges, 
regulations, the economy, Keystone Pipeline, and others. He has helped 
create today's booming economy and low unemployment. I give him credit 
for helping to do that, but these tariffs take us in exactly the 
opposite direction.
  These tariffs are dangerous. These tariffs are going to cost us jobs. 
These tariffs are going to lower our family incomes. These tariffs are 
going to undo much of the good the President and this Congress have 
done during the last year and a half to create this booming economy.
  I respectfully suggest that the President reconsider his trade 
policy, drop the tariffs as a tool for implementing his objectives, and 
find other, more effective means to persuade other countries to do for 
us what we do for them.
  I thank the Presiding Officer.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Colorado.