[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 11]
[House]
[Page 15703]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           RENEGOTIATE CAFTA

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Jones) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. JONES of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I am here on the floor 
again tonight to talk about my opposition to CAFTA, the Central 
American Free Trade Agreement.
  I want to start my comments by quoting Ross Perot who was a candidate 
for the presidency in October 1992. I quote Mr. Perot, ``You implement 
that NAFTA, the Mexican trade agreement, where they pay people a dollar 
an hour, have no health care, no retirement, no pollution control, and 
you are going to hear a giant sucking sound of jobs being pulled out of 
this country right at a time when we need the tax base to pay the 
debt.''
  That is what Mr. Perot said in 1992.
  Mr. Speaker, since NAFTA became the law of the land, let me tell you 
what happened in my State of North Carolina. North Carolina has lost 
over 200,000 manufacturing jobs. The United States has lost over 2.5 
million manufacturing jobs. CAFTA will continue these trends; 85 
percent of the language in CAFTA is identical to the language in NAFTA.
  Mr. Speaker, let me talk about Trade Promotion Authority, which I did 
not support. Since Trade Proportion Authority of August of 1992, North 
Carolina has lost over 52,000 manufacturing jobs; the United States has 
lost over 600,000 million manufacturing jobs.
  Mr. Speaker, CAFTA will do nothing else but to help eliminate jobs in 
this great Nation. I do not think we as a Nation can afford to continue 
to see jobs go overseas, whether they be to Central America, China or 
other countries.
  Mr. Speaker, this past weekend, I found an advertisement in a 
magazine, and it starts out, Are we blind? Can't we see what is 
happening to us? This is an ad by the Economy in Crisis. It is creating 
an awareness about our true economic conditions.
  Let me take just two aspects of this ad, Losing ownership and control 
of our country: We are losing ownership and control of our country 
through unsustainable balances of trade deficits. In the last 10 years, 
we have lost $3 trillion through these trade deficits. $1.3 trillion 
has been returned and used by foreign companies to buy our best 
companies like Chrysler, Amoco, Atlantic Richfield Oil, and 8,600 other 
great companies. For example, key chokepoints, industries like cement 
is 81 percent foreign owned. The movie industry is over 70 percent 
foreign owned.
  Mr. Speaker, additionally in this ad it says, How well and how long 
can we live like this? I read just one sentence, How secure can we be 
if we must live on imports and sell off or dismantle our factories?
  Mr. Speaker, that is what this is all about. CAFTA is not good for 
this country. You will see to my left and to my right, one is a 
newspaper article that says VF Jeanswear Closes Plant, 445 Jobs Gone By 
Next Summer. Mr. Speaker, those jobs went down to Honduras.
  Mr. Speaker, those jobs went down to Honduras. And just 2 years ago, 
in North Carolina, it says Pillowtex Goes Bust, Erasing 6,450 Jobs and 
the subtitle says, Five North Carolina Plants Closing in Largest Single 
Job Loss in State's History. That was just 2 years ago, Mr. Speaker, in 
2003.
  I do not know how we as a Congress can pass the CAFTA legislation as 
it is drawn. I agree with my friends on the other side of the aisle, 
Democrats and also Republicans who are opposed to CAFTA as it is drawn 
today. We need to rewrite, redraw this treaty with the Central American 
countries so that it can work for them as well as it works for the 
United States.
  Mr. Speaker, in closing, I would like to show the those in attendance 
on the floor a candy. It says: Candy decorated fruit snack. And this 
was made in China.
  Mr. Speaker, again, in closing, I hope that we on the House floor 
will do what is right, and that is to help protect jobs in America and 
help protect the American people who are working so hard to pay their 
taxes and meet their obligations.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask God to please bless our men and women in uniform 
and please bless America.

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