[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 152 (2006), Part 8]
[Senate]
[Pages 10414-10421]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




        SUSAN C. SCHWAB TO BE UNITED STATES TRADE REPRESENTATIVE

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
proceed to the following nomination, which the clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read the nomination of Susan C. 
Schwab, of Maryland, to be United States Trade Representative, with the 
rank of Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Debate on this nomination shall be as follows: 
Senator Dorgan for 30 minutes, Senator Conrad 15 minutes, Senator 
Baucus, 10 minutes, Senator Grassley, 30 minutes.
  The Senator from North Dakota is recognized.
  Mr. DORGAN. I ask unanimous consent the Senator from Iowa be 
recognized. I believe the Senator from Alabama wishes to be recognized. 
I am happy to proceed following those two.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa.
  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I strongly support the nomination of 
Susan Schwab to serve as U.S. Trade Representative.
  It is almost 7 months to the day since the Senate unanimously 
confirmed Ambassador Schwab to be Deputy U.S. Trade Representative.
  During her service in that position, Ambassador Schwab has amply 
demonstrated her qualifications to take over as our next trade 
representative.
  She successfully concluded negotiations of trade agreements with Peru 
and Columbia and has been actively engaged in the ongoing negotiations 
of the Doha Development Round of the World Trade Organization.
  Given her strong background in trade policy, it is not surprising, 
then, that Ambassador Schwab has served so well in her current 
position.
  Ambassador Schwab formally served as Assistant Secretary of Commerce 
and Director General of the United States and Foreign Commercial 
Service. That is an agency within the Department of Commerce with 
people on the ground in foreign countries pushing for the interest of 
U.S. businesses.
  She, herself, worked abroad to advance U.S. trade objectives while 
serving as a trade policy officer in the U.S. embassy in Tokyo.
  Her first job in Washington was as an agricultural trade negotiator 
for the Office of U.S. Trade Representative. Ambassador Schwab thus 
knows full well the importance and the challenge of advancing the trade 
interests of U.S. family farmers.
  Ambassador Schwab also has extensive experience working for the 
Congress of the United States, the very committee that I chair. She 
spent 8 years during the 1980s as a trade policy specialist and then as 
legislative director for then-Senator Danforth at a time when he 
chaired the trade subcommittee of this Committee on Finance.
  Ambassador Schwab is well aware of the important role Congress plays 
in U.S. trade policy. I look forward to working closely with her in 
advancing U.S. trade objectives.
  In addition, Ambassador Schwab has experience working on trade issues 
also in the private sector. At one point, she was director of corporate 
business development for Motorola. In that position, she engaged in 
strategic planning on behalf of Motorola in the continent of Asia.
  More recently, she served as dean of the University of Maryland 
School of Public Policy. That was from 1995 through the year 2003, and 
then as president and CEO of the University System of the Maryland 
Foundation, as well as serving as vice chancellor for advancement.
  Her academic and private-sector experiences complement her strong 
background in Government service. She is well rounded, in other words. 
Given the major challenges we face in advancing a robust trade agenda, 
it is especially important we have someone of Ambassador Schwab's 
caliber serving as U.S. Trade Representative dealing with 149 countries 
that are members of the World Trade Organization.
  We need to achieve substantial progress in Doha Round negotiations, 
and soon, if we are going to succeed in getting an agreement before 
trade promotion authority for the President of the United States 
expires next year. We still have a long way to go on those negotiations 
to reach an ambitious outcome that would be acceptable to me as 
chairman of the committee, but I think I can speak for the entire 
Congress on that point.
  We are also in the process of negotiating free trade agreements with 
a number of important trading partners, including South Korea and 
Malaysia. These are going to represent terrific

[[Page 10415]]

challenges. These are going to represent yet new challenges for her, 
particularly in addressing regulatory and other nontariff barriers to 
trade.
  It is essential our bilateral negotiations with South Korea, 
Malaysia, and other nations conclude in time to be considered under 
trade promotion authority which expires July next year.
  In addition, it is important our next trade representative continue 
to encourage meaningful regulatory reform in other major trading 
partners, especially Japan and China.
  I expect Ambassador Schwab to continue to push our trading partners 
to come into compliance with their existing trade obligations such as 
and not limited to these: Mexico's obligation under NAFTA and the World 
Trade Organization regarding the importation of U.S. agricultural 
products and China's obligations to protect intellectual property 
rights.
  Separately, I expect any bilateral agreement on Russia's access to 
the World Trade Organization will be concluded on strong, commercially 
meaningful terms and will not be rushed to meet some artificial 
deadline. Russia must demonstrate its willingness, its ability, and its 
commitment to abide by World Trade Organization rules.
  It is important we remind ourselves of the tremendous benefits we 
derive from open international trade because too often we hear 
criticism of our trading regimes. As an example, on average, over the 
past decade, our economy has created a net of 2 million jobs each year. 
In 2005, our unemployment rate dropped to 4.7 percent, which is well 
below the averages of the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s.
  An important part of our economic success is due to our trade. During 
the last decades, our exports have accounted for about one-quarter of 
U.S. economic growth. Jobs created by exports are estimated to pay 13 
to 18 percent more on average compared to jobs unrelated to exports.
  With respect to agriculture, approximately one-third of the acres 
planted in the United States are exported. Our service sector, which 
accounts for almost 70 percent of the U.S. economy, is anxious to break 
down barriers to our exports of services around the world.
  Today our services exports account for a little more than a quarter 
of the total U.S. exports of goods and services, so breaking down 
barriers to our services exports would go a long way toward helping us 
improve our trade deficit.
  Therefore, we in the Congress need to recommit ourselves to securing 
improved market access for our exporters, both in the Doha Round 
negotiations and by means of bilateral and regional trade agreements.
  I am confident Ambassador Schwab will effectively meet each of the 
many challenges she will face as our next trade representative. Her 
experience and her skills make it quite evident she is the right person 
for the job. I urge my colleagues to join me in supporting her 
nomination. Once confirmed, I look forward to working with her to 
advance an ambitious trade agenda and would expect her to consult under 
the law trade promotion authority with our committees when we ask her 
to and when she thinks it is necessary for her to make advances to us 
on that sort of communication because consultation between us prior to 
a negotiation being signed is the basis for the success and the 
opportunity to get such an agreement through the Congress.
  Mr. SHELBY. Would the Senator from Iowa let me speak for 2 or 3 
minutes as in morning business?
  I support the nominee. There is no objection by Senator Dorgan.
  Mr. GRASSLEY. The Senator can have whatever time he desires.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alabama.
  (The remarks of Mr. Shelby are printed in today's Record under 
``Morning Business.'')
  Mr. SHELBY. I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, what now is the business before the body?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Schwab nomination.
  Mr. CONRAD. I thank the Chair.
  Let me indicate as a member of the Finance Committee that we had 
hearings on the Schwab nomination. Let me stipulate that she is well 
qualified for the position. She is a lovely person, well educated and 
well trained. With all that said, after her testimony before the 
Finance Committee, I decided reluctantly that I would oppose her 
nomination. I want to share very briefly with the Members why I made 
that judgment.
  When Ms. Schwab came before the Finance Committee, I put up a chart 
showing what has happened to the trade deficit of the United States. 
The trade deficit soared to over $700 billion last year. I had another 
chart that showed what has happened to the trade deficit with Mexico 
since the NAFTA agreement. Before the NAFTA agreement, we had a trade 
surplus with Mexico of several billion dollars. Now we have a massive 
trade deficit with Mexico.
  I asked Ms. Schwab: Is this a successful trade policy?
  Her answer was: Yes.
  I told her: If this is a success, I would hate to see a failure. 
Because this trade policy is proving to be a disaster for the financial 
health of the United States. We are spending $700 billion a year more 
in purchases than we are in sales. A country cannot do that for very 
long.
  Then I asked her about agricultural trade policy. I asked her about 
the strategy of our trade ambassador going into the trade talks and 
making unilateral concessions, offering to cut support for our 
producers by 60 percent on the notion that then the other side would 
make concessions to us. I told her this is the strangest way to 
negotiate that I have ever seen. Unilateral concessions on the hope 
that the other side will follow suit--who has ever seen that in a 
negotiation? That is like going to the car dealership and agreeing to 
pay the sticker price. Why would you ever do that?
  Ms. Schwab told me this is actually a smart trade tactic, a 
negotiating tactic, that you make big concessions on the front end and 
then you get tougher at the end. I don't think that is smart. I think 
it is a disaster. We are in a circumstance in which the Europeans 
provide five times as much support for their producers as we provide 
for ours. They account for more than 90 percent of the export subsidy 
in the world. We are about 1 or 2 percent. So they have us outgunned 
there 70 or 80 to 1.
  Our idea of a negotiation is to make major unilateral concessions and 
then hope the other side gives in. What happened with this strategy? 
Did Europe then follow and make major concessions in response to ours? 
No. They made none.
  I fear we are pursuing a trade agenda that is simply not working. I 
would present as exhibit No. 1 record trade deficits, the biggest in 
our history and growing dramatically.
  Exhibit No. 2, NAFTA: We signed on to the NAFTA agreement. Our 
leadership told us this was going to be a great success. At the time we 
had a positive trade balance with Mexico. Now our trade deficit is 
measured in the tens of billions of dollars a year. This is a trade 
policy that is not working.
  I cannot support as our trade ambassador somebody who clearly 
believes that is a success. How could anyone define this as a success?
  I have reluctantly concluded that if we were to have a vote, and 
apparently this will be on a voice vote, I want it clearly recorded 
that I would vote ``no.''
  I thank the Chair and yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Dakota.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I understand there is an order with 
respect to my presentation on this matter.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has been allocated 30 minutes.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, this reminds me of Madam Tussaud's wax 
museum. It looks like there are people

[[Page 10416]]

here, except there is no movement. Month after month after month, we 
hear the results of unbelievably bad trade agreements that pull the rug 
out from under our workers and farmers, pulling the rug out from under 
our economy, ringing up the highest trade deficits in the our history, 
shipping American jobs overseas, even as we import cheap labor through 
the backdoor, and no one says a thing. No one does a thing. We today 
have a proposal before us to approve the nomination of a new U.S. trade 
ambassador. For what purpose?
  Let me describe what is happening with our trade deficit. This is the 
trade deficit from the most recent year going back to 1995. We are 
hemorrhaging in red ink.
  These are the largest trade deficits in the history of humankind, by 
far, not even close with any other country. What does this mean? This 
means that we are selling part of our country every day to those who 
live outside of our country. It is called the selling of America.
  We seem to think that it is all right to have a trade deficit of $2 
billion a day. That means that we import products more than we export 
to the rest of the world, and we pay for those imports with our 
currency or debt instruments. The result is at the moment the bank of 
Korea holds $200 billion of our currency; the Chinese, $750 billion; 
the Japanese, $800 billion; the Taiwanese, $250 billion. We are 
literally selling our country with these trade deficits every day.
  Trade deficits are not just about selling America piece by piece. It 
is about shipping American jobs overseas and undercutting American 
workers all at the same time.
  Winston Churchill said: The further backward you look, the further 
forward you can see. So I will look back a little bit. It is surprising 
to me that we have the nomination of a trade ambassador on the floor of 
the Senate and no real discussion, save that of my colleague, Senator 
Conrad, about the merits of where we are headed. This country is 
dangerously off-track with wildly inflated and mushroomed trade 
deficits. It is getting worse, much worse, not better. Yet there is not 
a whimper here in the Congress about it.
  Part of the reason is that the folks who work here are not going to 
have their jobs outsourced. No one wearing a blue suit and suspenders 
who hangs around here is going to have their job sent to China. If that 
were the case, we would have a change in trade policy immediately. But 
nobody loses their job here. For that matter, no journalist loses their 
job. That is why all you read, for example, in most of these major 
newspapers in support of this trade policy that, as we can see from 
this chart, is a massive failure. Just take a look at a portion of it. 
Two hundred billion of that $700 billion is with China alone. You can 
take a look at what is happening there, dramatic growth.
  Here is the trade strategy we are currently working under: exporting 
good American jobs and importing cheap labor. We just finished 
importing cheap labor with the immigration bill 2 weeks ago. I didn't 
support that. I voted against that. I voted against the trade 
agreements that have allowed us to export good jobs.
  I have gone through at great length in the Senate a range of issues. 
Let me use a couple to describe what has happened and what our trade 
agreements are about.
  We are now negotiating a trade agreement with Korea. Let me talk 
about automobile trade with Korea. See if anybody cares about that, see 
maybe if this new trade ambassador would care about that. Last year we 
got 730,863 cars coming in on ships from Korea. They loaded all the 
Korean cars on ships, sailed across the ocean and offloaded 730,000 
Korean cars in the United States.
  Guess how many American cars we were able to sell in Korea. Seven 
hundred thirty thousand? No. Four thousand two hundred. Ninety-nine 
percent of the automobiles on the streets in Korea are produced in 
Korea. Why? They don't want American vehicles to be allowed into their 
market. They want to send their vehicles here for sale, but they don't 
want our vehicles sold in Korea.
  This imbalance exists. Does anybody care about it? It doesn't mean a 
thing to most people. What it means to a lot of families is they have 
lost their jobs. United Auto Workers have lost their jobs. But nobody 
cares much about that because nobody in this Chamber is going to lose 
their job because of this imbalance in automobile trade.
  Japan: 95 percent of the cars driving in the streets of Japan are 
produced in Japan. Why don't we export more cars to Japan? They don't 
want them. They, like China and many other parts of the world, 
including Korea, want to exercise their right to send their products to 
the American marketplace, but they sure don't want to have their 
marketplace wide open to that which is produced by American workers. 
That is the last thing they want.
  Let me go back a few decades to 1970 or so. The largest American 
corporation was General Motors. In most cases people who went to work 
for GM worked there for a lifetime. That was their job. They were going 
to retire there and did. They worked there for a lifetime, got good 
pay, good benefits, good retirement. Now, 30 years later, the largest 
corporation in America is Wal-Mart. Average salary, according to 
published reports, is about $18,000 or $19,000 a year.
  A substantial portion of their employees have no benefits. Of those 
eligible for health care benefits, they pay double the amount that most 
employees of corporations would pay for health care. Many of those who 
do have full-time jobs at low salaries cannot afford the benefits that 
are offered. So have we made progress in these 30 years?
  By the way, with respect to Wal-Mart, 70 percent of the products on 
their shelves is from China. Wal-Mart's pressure will lead them to 
close their American operations and move them to China. The only way to 
sell it the way the we want to is have it produced in China, where you 
can pay a worker 33 cents an hour.
  I read a month or so ago that China has finally purchased Whammo 
Corporation. There are a lot of companies moving, deciding they cannot 
afford to produce in America anymore. They don't want to pay U.S. 
workers decent wages. They want to produce in China for 33 cents an 
hour, where you don't have to worry about health care and retirement. 
We have seen 4 million to 5 million American jobs gone from our 
country.
  I noticed in the newspaper that Chinese purchased Whammo 
Corporation--Frisbee, Hula Hoop, Slip 'N Slide. It is sort of the hood 
ornament on what is wrong with our trade. So Whammo is gone. What about 
the steelworker in America or the textile worker in America or the 
metal fabricator in America or the family farmer or the software 
engineer--their jobs are gone in increasing numbers.
  Alan Blinder, the former vice chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, 
said recently in a Foreign Affairs article that there are roughly are 
42 million to 56 million jobs in America that are subject to being 
outsourced to other countries--China, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, 
and more.
  American companies have discovered that this large planet has a 
billion to a billion and a half people, and perhaps more, where if you 
move the technology and capital, you can employ people in other parts 
of the world for pennies. You can hire kids, you can work 12-year-olds 
12 hours a day and pay them 12 cents an hour. You can ship the product 
to Toledo, Fargo, Los Angeles, or Lansing, MI, and say to the American 
producer and business and worker: Compete with that. The fact is, you 
cannot compete with that, and you should not be asked to compete with 
that.
  We fought for a century in this country for the standards of 
production that have made this a great place and allowed us to expand 
the middle class. I have spoken before about James Fyler, who died of 
lead poisoning; he was shot 54 times. Earlier in this century, he and 
others were standing up for the right of people to organize, for 
workers to be able to organize. We finally became a country in which 
workers can organize without having to go

[[Page 10417]]

to prison, like they do in China. I have the names of people sitting in 
prison in China because they wanted to organize workers for a fair 
deal. We signed the Fair Labor Standards Act in this country and 
established a minimum wage and gave people the right to organize. We 
did a whole series of things--child labor laws--that have established 
the conditions of production, that produced a burgeoning middle class 
and the strongest economy the world has ever known. Now it is 
systematically being taken apart. I know it is hard to see day by day, 
but you watch what is happening in this country to the good jobs, the 
jobs with security that pay well, with benefits. One by one, 1,000 by 
1,000 and, yes, a million by a million, they are leaving this country.
  No, it is not just the bottom rung of the economic ladder; it is also 
engineers, software producers, and others. Nobody here seems to care 
very much. This Congress certainly doesn't. This Congress supports all 
that. This Congress supports giving a tax break to companies that ship 
their jobs overseas. Show me a company that fires all the American 
workers and ships their jobs to China, and I will tell you that this 
Congress supports giving that company a tax break--$1.2 billion a year 
our current Tax Code spends in tax cuts to companies that ship their 
American jobs overseas. It is unbelievable.
  I have offered four amendments in this Senate to shut that perverse 
tax break down and I have lost four times. In 2005, Bo Anderson, one of 
the top executives at General Motors dealing with parts and supplies, 
called 380 parts and suppliers together; he called the executives of 
the parts suppliers to a meeting. He said to them that you need to be 
building your automobile parts in China to reduce the cost. In other 
words, move those jobs offshore, get rid of those American workers. 
Delphi, which used to be the largest General Motors parts supplier, 
were paying workers $26 to $30 an hour with benefits. Well, that is 
over. They are in bankruptcy and, of course, it is blamed on the 
workers. Nobody talked about the executives and what role they might 
have had. They want to outsource the jobs, and for the jobs they would 
keep here, they want to pay $8 to $10 an hour. I am wondering how you 
create a country with a growing middle class and a consumer ability to 
make purchases in this country if jobs are going elsewhere in search of 
pennies an hour. IBM laid off 13,000 people; they are going to ship the 
jobs to India. They said to workers, by the way: This is not a comment 
on the excellent work you have done. See you later. Your job is gone.
  The question is, What are we building and what does all this mean? 
The reason I mention all of this is that all of it comes from trade 
agreements. We have all of these trade agreements, and one is NAFTA 
with Mexico. We turned a small trade surplus into a giant deficit with 
Mexico. It is pretty unbelievable when you think about it. My colleague 
says that the current nominee believes that the trade agreement with 
Mexico is a huge success. She has not lost her job to outsourcing 
either. But it is not a success by any standard. The trade deficit with 
Mexico and with Canada and with Europe, with Japan, Korea, and China--
it is a disaster. Nobody seems to care much.
  Now, I want to talk a little about this notion of free trade. It 
sounds like such a wonderful term, ``free trade.'' Freedom. Free trade 
means that you want to substitute that which we have fought for and 
built, that which people have died for, that which people have debated 
for a long time--what are the standards of production? What is being an 
American all about? What is protecting children? What is a fair wage? 
What is a safe workplace? What is the right to organize worth? It is 
trading that in and saying none of that matters. The largest 
corporations can pole-vault over all of it and move their factory to 
China. We are taking apart that which we built for a century. That is 
what the trade agreements are doing. I have shown you the red ink. So 
the trade agreements are an abysmal failure.
  I would like to speak now about something that we learned very 
recently, involving sweatshops in the country of Jordan.
  At the outset, let me say that the trade agreement with Jordan was 
slightly better than all the others. I give credit to President Clinton 
because they negotiated a free trade agreement with Jordan that had 
standards with respect to workers' rights, for a change. So it was a 
step forward--not a giant step but a step in the right direction.
  What has happened to trade with Jordan since that time? The New York 
Times has written an article based on some work by the National Labor 
Committee. They have done terrific work investigating what is going on 
in Jordan. Remember, this was supposed to have created the gold 
standard for labor protection for workers, signed in 1999. But what 
happened since then is that Jordan has flown in so-called guest workers 
from countries such as Bangladesh and China to make products in Jordan 
for export to this country. So we see products in stores such as Wal-
Mart, Target, and others, that have now, we know, come from sweatshops 
in Jordan under our free trade agreement.
  Here is how the New York Times describes these sweat shops:

       Propelled by a free trade agreement with the U.S., apparel 
     manufacturing is booming in Jordan. Exports to America are 
     soaring twentyfold in the last 5 years. But some foreign 
     workers in Jordanian factories that produce garments for 
     Target, Wal-Mart, and others are complaining of dismal 
     conditions--of 20-hour days, of not being paid for months and 
     months, of being hit by supervisors and of being jailed when 
     they complain.

  These factories in Jordan are flying in planeloads of workers from 
the poorest countries, such as Bangladesh, to work in slavelike 
conditions. They also ship in Chinese materials--textiles in this 
case--to those manufacturers. What you end up with are Bangladesh 
workers working up to 120 hours a week in sweatshops in Jordan piecing 
together Chinese materials to be shipped into the United States under 
free trade agreements to be sold in a Wal-Mart or a Target.
  Is that what free trade agreements are supposed to be about? I don't 
think so.
  The workers at these Jordanian sweatshops testified they were forced 
to work far below minimum wages, promised $120 a month, but in many 
cases they were not paid at all. One worker paid $50 for 5 months of 
work. It is unbelievable to see what is going on.
  Then when this is exposed in the New York Times, you hear people say: 
Well, we had no idea this was going on. It is kind of akin to the 
French police chief in the movie Casablanca, he was shocked to find 
that there was gambling taking place in Rick's Cafe. Nobody ought to be 
shocked by this. This is what is going on in the world.
  I am going to introduce legislation at the end of my presentation 
today dealing with these issues of sweatshops and how we try to respond 
to them. My legislation will establish substantial civil penalties for 
the import of sweatshop goods. When sweatshop factories abuse workers 
for profit, the best way to attack the problem is to take that profit 
away. If the Federal Trade Commission determined that an overseas 
factory was producing sweatshop labor, it would issue an order 
prohibiting importation from that factory. Violation would carry a 
civil penalty, and each separate violation would be a separate offense. 
Also, my bill would allow U.S. retailers the right to sue their 
competitors in U.S. courts if their competitors are sourcing their 
merchandise from these sweatshop factories.
  I feel strongly that as we come to talk about trade today and the 
nomination of a new trade ambassador, we ought to talk about what is 
going on in the real world. I have described previously so many 
stories. I was going to talk about Maytag--you know, the repairman who 
has nothing to do, and part of that is because Maytag is moving its 
jobs overseas these days.
  Here are the dancing grapes in this picture. I love the dancing 
grapes from Fruit of the Loom. They make shorts and T-shirts that are 
all over America, and they have these people dressed up

[[Page 10418]]

as grapes. Who on Earth would dress up as a grape? I guess a job is a 
job. Who is dancing in grape suits these days? That is the way they 
advertise this American underwear. Guess what. It may still be all-
American underwear, but it is not made here anymore. They danced right 
out of this country. Fruit of the Loom is gone to Mexico. And it is not 
just Fruit of the Loom. The best example I know is Huffy bicycles. They 
are now a Chinese company. They got rid of all their Ohio workers; they 
fired them because they made too much money, $11 an hour. They have now 
become a Chinese company. You can still buy them here, and they produce 
a product they call all-American. It is just that they are made in 
China. I happen to know where. They pay 33 cents an hour there, and all 
those American workers who lost jobs, who had a long career making 
these bicycles at the largest bicycle plant in the world, they were 
told: Your career is over. You make too much money at $11 an hour, so 
Huffy has gone to China. If you had a Huffy years ago, you noticed 
there was an American flag decal on the front. That is gone too. Now it 
is a decal of the globe.
  By the way, on the last day of work at Huffy Bicycles, when their 
jobs left for China, I was told that when the workers left the parking 
lot, as they drove out of the lot, they left a pair of empty shoes in 
the space where their car was. It was a way of saying to the company 
that you can move our jobs to China, but you are not going to be able 
to fill our shoes. That is how much they cared about their jobs.
  Little red wagon, Radio Flyer--I bet there is not a kid around who 
hasn't ridden in that little red wagon. Of course, that was American 
for a century. Gone to China. The list goes on and on. I could talk for 
hours about companies.
  Levi's. There is not one pair of Levi's made in America. Talk about 
all-American jeans--there is not one pair of Levi's made in America. If 
you wear Tony Lama boots, you might be wearing boots made in China, by 
the way. The list goes on and on.
  The question for this nominee for the U.S. Trade Ambassador's job is, 
Do you care whether these jobs are gone from our country? Do you care 
whether Americans are now asked to compete against those in other parts 
of the world who make 33 cents an hour? Do you care about that? Do you 
care that our workers are asked to compete against young kids, some of 
them locked in manufacturing plants, some of them hand-weaving rugs, 
some of them whose fingertips were scarred by putting sulfur on the 
fingertips and lighting the sulfur in order to produce a scar so that 
when they are using the needles on the rug and they stick their 
fingers, they won't bleed? Do you care about all that?
  How about a trade policy that stands up for the interests of our 
country? Yes, I think we ought to trade. Yes, I think expanded trade is 
good for our country. But it must be and has to be fair trade. You 
cannot say to companies: All right, we have decided over a century what 
the conditions of production are in this country that represent a 
growing middle class and a growing economy and a humane way to do 
things. We have decided that, but you can avoid all of that by just 
deciding to shut your American manufacturing plant, move the jobs 
elsewhere, and if somebody messes with you when your plant has moved 
overseas and they want to organize workers for better wages, you can 
get the government to throw them in prison. If somebody cares about you 
putting poisons in the water and the air, pumping effluent and 
pollution into the water and the air, you don't have to worry about 
that because you can do that with impunity. When somebody says you 
can't hire children, you don't have to worry about that because you can 
put kids in your manufacturing plant. And if somebody says OSHA is 
going to come, you can say: There ain't no OSHA here; I can do what I 
want here. And by the way, when I get the product produced, I am 
shipping it to the United States of America because I have store 
shelves to fill and I have American customers who want low prices. I 
know, they are the same customers who are going to drive Korean cars to 
the store, wear their Italian shoes, wear their Taiwanese shirt, wear 
their Chinese slacks, and they are going to wonder where all the 
American jobs went.
  I would like to ask one of these days when we have a change in the 
U.S. trade ambassador's job what they really think success is. Do you 
really believe this hemorrhaging of red ink, selling America $2 billion 
a day to foreign governments, foreign enterprises, do you really 
believe that can continue? It cannot. That just cannot continue.
  And, oh, by the way, the strategy I described earlier that I believe 
doesn't add up for our country is a strategy by which we tell 
companies: You can export good American jobs, and you can import cheap 
labor. That was the immigration bill, the last portion--export good 
jobs, import cheap labor. I am saying that doesn't add up.
  At least a portion of that--exporting good jobs and importing cheap 
labor--is now attended to by a desire to decide that when you export 
good jobs and import cheap labor, you can run your profits through the 
Cayman Islands so you don't have to pay taxes in this country.
  This little house, I have told my colleagues before, this five-story 
white house, called the Ugland House on Church Street in the Cayman 
Islands, is home to 12,748 corporations. That is right. They are not 
there; it is just a figment of someone's imagination. Lawyers have 
established this address for 12,748 corporations for one purpose, and 
that is to avoid paying U.S. taxes. It is unbelievable, if you think 
about it.
  So export your jobs, import your products here, sell them in the 
United States, and run your income through the Cayman Islands. I am 
just saying none of this adds up and none of it works.
  I agree with my colleague who described a while ago his opposition to 
this trade ambassador. I don't believe the nominee is unqualified, I 
just believe there our trade policy is terribly misguided. That is 
pretty troublesome because I don't think this country will have the 
kind of economic strength that expands so that our kids have jobs, good 
jobs that pay well with benefits in the future. I don't think it is 
going to happen. I wish I were wrong. I don't think I am. Yet all this 
continues in a giant silence. Nobody seems to care very much.
  Let's just continue doing this. We will sell a little bit of America 
every single day, keep shipping jobs elsewhere, not think much about it 
because we can buy a cheap product at Wal-Mart, and it will be just 
fine. Be happy. I am just saying I don't think this adds up for our 
country's future.
  I don't support this nomination because I want a nominee at the U.S. 
trade ambassador's office who is going to stand up for a trade policy 
that is fair for this country--fair trade.
  A colleague just came into the Chamber who comes from a State that 
has a lot of ranching. We are not getting beef into Japan at the 
moment. That is a different story. It is unbelievable with the trade 
deficit that we can't get beef into Japan. Let's assume that problem 
was resolved tomorrow. Every pound of beef that would go into Japan 
would have a 50-percent tariff on it, and that's 16 years after we had 
a beef agreement with Japan. That is just a tiny little example, beef 
to Japan. That would be considered a failure by any standard, a 50-
percent tariff a decade and a half after the beef agreement.
  We blithely go along and say: Be happy, it will be fine, drive to 
Wal-Mart and pick up an Etch-A-Sketch and be happy. It doesn't matter. 
This will all work out in the end.
  Mr. President, how much time remains?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has 1 minute remaining.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for 4 additional 
minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I conclude by describing one of the 
concerns I have about the silence on these issues. Some long while ago, 
I was on

[[Page 10419]]

the floor of the House of Representatives when there was a joint 
meeting of Congress. A fellow named Lech Walesa was speaking to 
Congress at a joint meeting.
  Lech Walesa told a story--pretty unbelievable--a story, of course, I 
had known from the history books. He told us this: He said it was 
Saturday morning in a shipyard in Gdansk, Poland. He had been fired 
from his job as an electrician from this plant. He went back into the 
shipyards on Saturday morning to lead a labor strike against the 
Communist government, believing workers ought to have the right to 
self-determination. He went back in to lead a strike against the 
Communist government. They seized him that Saturday morning and 
brutally beat him, beat him bloody, took him to the edge of a fence 
that was heightened with barbed wire and threw him over the barbed-wire 
fence into the dirt on the other side of the fence.
  He laid in the dirt face down, bleeding, having been beaten severely. 
He told us he wondered what he should do next. As he lay there, he 
decided what to do next. He picked himself up, climbed back over the 
fence into the shipyard, right back into the same shipyard that 
morning. Ten years later, this unemployed electrician was identified by 
the Doorkeeper of the U.S. House of Representatives as the President of 
the country of Poland--not an intellectual, not a military leader, not 
a business leader, just an unemployed electrician with the guts to take 
on the Communist government for a free labor movement.
  They called it Solidarity. We all celebrated solidarity. What a 
wonderful thing it was. We supported Solidarity. He said to us: We 
didn't have any guns; the Communists had all the guns. We had no 
bullets; the Communists had all the bullets. We were workers armed with 
an idea. We were armed only with an idea; that is, people ought to be 
free to choose their own destiny.
  What is the idea here? What is the idea in America by which we fought 
for 100 years for the basic standards, by which we expanded the middle 
class, safe workplaces, decent wages, the right to organize? What is 
that idea, and does it have value now, or have we forgotten that idea 
and is there someone willing to stand for that idea today?
  I hope so. I don't believe we ought to decide that which we created 
is somehow unworthy as we look to the future of this country, and I 
believe we ought to continue to build a place that is better for our 
children. We want a place, all of us want a place we can turn over to 
our children and grandchildren that is better than the place we 
inherited. That ought to be the goal.
  I don't intend to ask for a recorded vote, but I do not support this 
nomination only because I think we are headed toward a trade strategy--
and we have been in the middle of it for some long while now--that is 
injuring this country and is going to ship jobs overseas.
  As I said when I started, Alan Blinder, a respected Vice Chairman of 
the Federal Reserve Board, said there are 42 million to 56 million 
American jobs at this point subject to outsourcing. Those not 
outsourced are still going to be required to compete with others in the 
world who make a great deal less money. That is not the way we are 
going to continue to build the economy we believed we were building for 
the last century.
  I am not suggesting putting walls around our country. I am not a 
xenophobe. I am not an isolationist. I am not one who believes trade is 
not worthy. I do. But I think this country ought to insist and lead in 
the area of demanding fair trade, demanding trade be fair, standing up 
for our businesses, standing up for our workers, and saying we insist 
on and demand fair trade.
  Ms. MIKULSKI. Mr. President, I speak today in support of the 
nomination of Dr. Susan Schwab to be the U.S. Trade Representative. I 
have known Susan for a long time and have seen her great leadership and 
vision as dean of the University of Maryland School of Public Policy. 
As dean, Susan helped the school grow into one of the top public policy 
programs in the Nation.
  I support fair trade, so American workers can compete. Dr. Schwab has 
demonstrated her commitment to this approach and to ensuring our 
Nation's economic competitiveness. Our top trade representative needs 
to be tough, smart, and have experience standing up for American 
interests. Dr. Schwab clearly fits that bill as well.
  Dr. Schwab's qualifications for this position are first-rate. She is 
a former Foreign Service officer, serving in the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo 
and as a trade negotiator at the USTR. The experience of serving on the 
front lines of an office she will now help lead is particularly 
important. Dr. Schwab also has extensive experience in both the 
legislative and executive branches of the Federal Government. She was 
legislative director for Senator John Danforth and served as Assistant 
Secretary of Commerce and Director-General of the U.S. & Foreign 
Commercial Service in the first Bush administration.
  In addition to her practical experience, Dr. Schwab is accomplished 
academically. While dean of the Maryland School of Public Policy, she 
taught a variety of graduate courses on U.S. trade policy and 
international relations. Dr. Schwab received her Ph.D. in public 
administration and international business from the George Washington 
University. She holds a master's in development policy from Stanford 
University and a bachelor's from Williams College.
  I ask my colleagues to join me in supporting this nomination.
  Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, I am pleased to offer my strong support 
and endorsement of the confirmation of Ambassador Susan Schwab as U.S. 
Trade Representative. During her long career in public service, 
Ambassador Schwab has dedicated herself to advocating for the best 
interests of the United States in the global economy. I was delighted 
when I learned that the President had nominated her for the position of 
U.S. Trade Representative, a position for which she is ideally suited.
  Throughout the 1980s, Ambassador Schwab was as a trade policy 
specialist and then legislative director for Senator John C. Danforth, 
playing a major role in numerous U.S. trade policy initiatives, 
including landmark trade legislation that Congress enacted in 1984 and 
1988. While serving on the staff of Senator William S. Cohen and as 
staff director of the Subcommittee on Government Oversight, I worked 
closely with Ambassador Schwab on a number of trade issues affecting 
Maine and its industries.
  In particular, Ambassador Schwab worked with our staff to support 
Maine's shoe industry and its workers during the industry's massive 
dislocations in the 1980s. She was instrumental in helping us develop 
legislation to address the industry's dire situation in those years, 
including critical improvements to antidumping, countervailing duty, 
and safeguard provisions. She also worked closely with our staff to 
improve market access for Maine agricultural goods in foreign markets.
  Ambassador Schwab's professional and personal record of service will 
enable her to effectively represent U.S. interests around the world. 
She will make an outstanding U.S. Trade Representative.
  Mr. BAUCUS. Mr. President, I strongly support the nomination of Susan 
Schwab to be our next U.S. Trade Representative. I have known and 
worked with Ambassador Schwab for many years. She has had a stellar 
career as a trade negotiator, a senior congressional staffer, a 
businesswoman, and a university administrator and professor.
  I recently read a piece about Ambassador Schwab in the Washington 
Post. That article described her as ``a hard-nosed pragmatist, well 
versed in arcane trade economics, and a dazzling strategist and 
negotiator.''
  She was described as excelling as ``a strategic thinker and consensus 
builder . . . able to quickly synthesize the thinking of Congress, the 
administration and special-interest groups.''
  That Washington Post article is 19 years old. It is from July 1987. 
By that point, Ambassador Schwab had already honed her reputation in 
the international trade community.

[[Page 10420]]

  She had already negotiated tricky agriculture agreements in the Tokyo 
Round. She had already helped draft provisions of U.S. trade law--like 
Super 301--that became a fixture of U.S. trade policy for the next 
decade.
  She had already attracted both fear and admiration among many of our 
most recalcitrant trading partners.
  Nineteen years later, Ambassador Schwab continues to demonstrate her 
skill as a seasoned trade negotiator. In her tenure as Deputy U.S. 
Trade Representative, she has settled one of the most difficult and 
complicated trade issues--our dispute with Canada over subsidized 
imports of softwood lumber.
  She has worked tirelessly with our trading partners on trade 
agreements, and she has worked to obtain consensus among the 149 
members of the World Trade Organization in the ongoing Doha Round 
negotiations.
  Ambassador Schwab will need all of her skills to carry out the job as 
U.S. Trade Representative. We have entered one of the most difficult 
periods in trade policy that I can remember--both with our trading 
partners and domestically.
  At the top of Ambassador Schwab's agenda will be shoring up the Doha 
Round. Unless something changes soon, these talks are at serious risk 
of collapse.
  Our trading partners continue to believe that America alone must make 
the concessions necessary for these talks to conclude. They forget that 
negotiations are two-way. They are give and take.
  As I have told Ambassador Schwab, I will not be in a position to 
support any result out of the Doha Round unless several results are 
achieved: No. 1, the EU must commit to serious and meaningful 
reductions in agriculture tariffs; No. 2, Brazil, India, and developing 
world countries must commit to serious and meaningful reductions in 
industrial tariffs; and No. 3, our key trading partners must agree to 
open further their services markets.
  Ambassador Schwab will also face serious challenges in our bilateral 
trade and economic relationship with China. China often makes 
promises--in the WTO and bilaterally--that it does not always keep. For 
instance, in April, China promised to lift its ban on U.S. beef. But 
China still has not done so, and it appears to be in no hurry.
  In the coming months, I hope to work with Ambassador Schwab in 
creating a more sustained, structured, and comprehensive dialogue with 
China that allows the United States to hold China's feet to the fire on 
the promises that it makes.
  And we also need a better framework to seek out ways to cooperate 
more effectively on issues of mutual economic interest.
  Ambassador Schwab will also be responsible for negotiating the most 
challenging free-trade agreements to date. Agreements with Korea and 
Malaysia--our 7th and 10th largest trading partners respectively--hold 
great promise. But each presents unique and difficult issues that we 
must address in order to build political support for these agreements 
at home.
  That will be Ambassador Schwab's greatest challenge--building 
political support for trade at home. It is no secret that support for 
trade has evaporated.
  Since Congress granted this administration trade promotion authority 
in 2002, Members have been asked to take a series of difficult votes on 
trade agreements with small countries of limited commercial value.
  Since that time, the concerns Members of Congress have expressed 
about the administration's trade strategy have fallen on deaf ears, and 
since that time, support for trade among usually protrade constituents 
has waned considerably.
  As a result, when trade promotion authority expires next year, I do 
not think Congress will renew it without major changes. I do not 
anticipate new fast-track authority until Congress, the administration, 
and all relevant stakeholders are willing to engage in a serious 
discussion. They need to answer the tough questions that remain 
unaddressed: questions relating to trade adjustment assistance and 
other programs to help those who may be hurt by trade, questions about 
the role of labor in our trade agreements, and questions relating to 
the relationship between trade and a competitive U.S. economy.
  These are hard issues, and Ambassador Schwab will have to face them 
head-on. But I have full confidence that Ambassador Schwab has the 
skills, experience, and the guts to tackle them. Indeed, she spent most 
of the 1980s grappling with very similar issues when she worked for 
Senator Danforth in both the majority and the minority.
  Nineteen years ago, the Washington Post described Susan Schwab as a 
``strategic thinker'' and a ``consensus builder.'' We need these skills 
at the U.S. Trade Representative, now more than ever.
  I look forward to working closely with Ambassador Schwab and urge my 
Colleagues to vote to confirm her today.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, today I rise to give my complete support 
for Ambassador Susan Schwab who will become our Nation's Trade 
Representative.
  I have been dismayed that the Senate did not move more quickly on 
this nomination. I have also been disappointed by the opinions, of 
some, who state that her nomination is an indication that the 
administration is deemphasizing trade policy.
  Obviously, these individuals do not know Ambassador Schwab.
  I, on the other hand, have had that privilege of working with her and 
join the vast majority of my colleagues in stating that that Ambassador 
Schwab is a tenacious, forceful, yet thoughtful advocate of our 
Nation's trade agenda.
  Our Nation is at a critical juncture. In 2005, the United States 
trade deficit widened to a record $726 billion, increasing to 5.8 
percent of the Gross Domestic Product from 5.3 percent in 2004, and 4.5 
percent in 2003.
  Many economists now describe the trade deficit as unsustainable. For 
example, C. Fred Bergsten, Director of the Institute for International 
Economics, has pointed out ``the United States must now attract almost 
$7 billion of capital from the rest of the world every day to finance 
our current account deficit and our own foreign investment outflows.''
  In order to meet these challenges, we need our best and brightest 
working on solutions. Solutions that ensure that that the Doha Round 
lives up to its potential, while ensuring that a level playing field is 
created for American farmers, manufactures and service providers.
  Solutions that enable the United States to move expeditiously in our 
free trade negotiations with Korea and Malaysia thereby providing 
unfettered access to these markets.
  Mr. President, I cannot think of anyone better suited to find these 
solutions then Ambassador Susan Schwab. I am very pleased that the 
Senate confirmed her nomination just minutes ago.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wyoming.
  Mr. THOMAS. Mr. President, how much time is on this side?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Senator Grassley controls 20 minutes.
  Mr. THOMAS. Mr. President, it is a pleasure for me to have the 
opportunity to discuss the nominee who is before the Senate. I am 
chairman of the Trade Subcommittee on the Finance Committee, so I have 
had an opportunity to deal with some of these issues for some time. I 
was also chairman of the Foreign Relations subcommittee on Asia and the 
Pacific Rim. These are areas about which I feel strongly.
  Fortunately, I had a good deal of opportunity to visit with Susan 
Schwab, the President's nominee for U.S. Trade Representative.
  Obviously, this is a very important position, the position that Rob 
Portman had over the past 9 months or a year. He has done an excellent 
job of representing the United States in a situation that is not easy.
  The United States is a little different from most countries in the 
world. They see us a little differently. They expect more from us than 
we should be asked to give, but nevertheless that continues to be the 
case. We have to seek to find equality and fairness.

[[Page 10421]]

  Based on my discussions with her, I think she is an outstanding 
selection. Senator Grassley talked about her background, and certainly 
she is well prepared for the position. Her credentials speak for 
themselves. That is very important in this issue.
  Trade is very easy to talk about. Some of my friends on the other 
side talk about trade is all bad and there is nothing right about it. 
There is a lot to trade that we have to figure out. We have a lot of 
demand for overseas goods and, of course, we are the biggest buyer in 
the world; therefore, we are the biggest trader in the world. So it 
feels a little differently. It doesn't mean we should not have fair and 
equal treatment. That is what we seek to have, and that will be the 
task she undertakes. She will be a strong voice for American trade 
policy. I believe that is excellent, and I am so pleased.
  We are the largest trading nation in the world, and the world is 
changing, as we know. Twenty years ago, it was quite different. 
Everyone was fairly isolated. Now, with the kind of communications we 
have and the kind of transportation that is available--why, there are 
billions of dollars moving around the world every day. It becomes quite 
difficult. The countries are changing very fast.
  We deal with China today much differently than we did 10 years ago, 
as we will have to in the future. Foreign trade is not an easy matter 
with which to deal. What we need to seek and do seek is fairness. 
Frankly, that is a little difficult in the world because everyone 
thinks that because we are such a prosperous country, they should have 
special treatment. But our effort has been to have fair trade, and that 
ought to be what we do, and that is what we are seeking.
  I have met with Susan Schwab and talked about that point, and the 
fact that we are the largest trading country in the world should not 
give others an unfair advantage. We need to trade in a fair way, and I 
think that is what she is committed to do, and certainly I support her 
for that.
  We are the largest trading nation in the world. So, of course, we are 
the target of most everyone who wants to increase their sales. We also, 
however, have some opportunities to increase our sales as well, and we 
are doing some of that. Our demand, because the size of our economy, of 
course, is large, and we are interested in pursuing those kinds of 
opportunities. So trade is going to happen, and it is going to 
increasingly happen as times change and the world becomes smaller. 
Simply because of our ability to communicate and our ability to move 
around the world, it will become smaller.
  So the challenge is how we can trade fairly with these other 
countries. Many of them think, Oh, you are the big, rich country; you 
ought to be able to give us a lot of things. That really ought not to 
be what we are dealing with. We ought to be dealing with fair trade. I 
think that is the point. It is what I have talked to Susan Schwab 
about, and she certainly is agreeable to that.
  More than 25 percent of the U.S. gross domestic product is tied to 
trade, so it is an important aspect of our economy. Ninety-six percent 
of the world's consumers live outside of the United States. So in terms 
of our production, we need to be involved in world trade and we need to 
make it fair. And that really, of course, is the challenge.
  It is easy to be critical about everything we do in trade. The fact 
is, particularly with some of the commodities in my State of Wyoming, 
trade is about selling our markets somewhere else. So we need to 
understand that. Again, the key is fair trade and that is what we are 
talking about. We need to find ways to open the world market to our 
goods and our services, and we ought to be able to enter into the 
market on the same basis as anyone else, and at the same time hold 
others to the same considerations that we have when they come here. We 
need to pursue both bilateral and multilateral negotiations, and of 
course that is what we are doing. And we need strong leadership to do 
it and to represent our interests in these discussions.
  So I think that is exactly what we will be able to do. We are making 
progress.
  My colleague mentioned the fact of the cow business in Japan. Well, 
that is a problem. Frankly, it is not a trade problem as much as it is 
a mad cow disease problem. It has been handled wrong, and we are 
working toward getting that resolved. Our best potential and the 
largest growth we have in the beef industry and exports has been in 
Asia. That is where we are now. We have been able to open up the 
markets in Australia and in South Korea, and we had the markets pretty 
much open in Japan until the mad cow disease came along, and now we are 
in the process, hopefully, of getting them open again. So that is very 
important, and we need to continue certainly to do that.
  We need a strong leader to represent our interests. I think that is 
exactly what we will get with Susan Schwab, and that leadership is what 
we need. Bob Portman has done a very good job, and she has worked with 
him, of course, in getting us into this position. So we need to have 
good leadership to walk away from some of the bad agreements, the tough 
agreements that we have had. The world is sometimes difficult to deal 
with, but Susan Schwab will provide that leadership.
  During her testimony before the Finance Committee, of which I am a 
member, she stated:

       It will take more than a willing spirit to forge good trade 
     policy in the next 5 years. It will require us to keep the 
     multilateral process on track in the WTO, to negotiate 
     commercially significant free trade agreements, and to 
     enforce vigorously the terms of those agreements and to 
     uphold the rules of trade.

  So that is what we are really faced with. These smaller countries, 
these countries that frankly generally have less economic strength than 
we do and they always want special treatment: Well, you guys can afford 
that. What we need is fair trade, and that is what trade is all about, 
and that is why it takes a leader to do that. So I am very pleased that 
she is there and that she is willing to do this. She is well trained to 
do it.
  She further stated that her success may require:

       An honest, sometimes blunt, but always respectful exchange 
     of views, along with a willingness to compromise when 
     possible and the strength to stand firm when necessary.

  The strength to stand firm when necessary. To me, that is probably 
the most important element of the trade negotiations that we enter 
into, is to be able to stand firm on what we agree on, and we ought to 
be in a position to do that when we are as big a buyer as we are. We 
also need to have some muscle on the other side, and we can do that.
  I am pleased with the commitment she has made to reach out and listen 
and consult with Members of Congress on both sides of the aisle. 
Engaging Congress in a bipartisan way upfront and throughout the 
process will be crucial, and she will do that. Ms. Schwab understands 
this, and I am confident that she will follow through.
  So I look forward to working with her. I am looking forward to one of 
the important elements of our economy, and that is world trade, and 
doing it in a fair manner.
  Mr. President, I yield back all time on behalf of Republicans and 
Democrats and ask for a vote.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is, Will the Senate advise and 
consent to the nomination of Susan C. Schwab, of Maryland, to be United 
States Trade Representative?
  The nomination was confirmed.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the President will 
be immediately notified of the Senate's action.

                          ____________________