Ron Wyden

Mr. WYDEN

Mr. WYDEN. On my side of the aisle, my colleagues on the Democratic side of the aisle felt strongly about the currency issue. Senator Stabenow, for example, and many others felt very strongly about the amendment Senator Warren sought to offer. We were able, working together, to in effect get an equal number for each side. My understanding is that we continue to be interested--and you just, I think, made another gracious offer. We are going to stay here tonight. You are still interested in putting together a list that gives all sides a fair chance at their major amendments. Is that a fair recitation of where we are now, Mr. Chairman?

Mr. WYDEN. Will the distinguished chairman yield for a question?

Mr. WYDEN. Not at all. The question is, Mr. Chairman, we worked together to put together this list, and it was based on the proposition that we were going to be fair to both sides.

Mr. WYDEN. I appreciate that, and I appreciate the chairman's work. I want to ask a question about where, in effect, we are. The two of us worked together on the list----

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I appreciate greatly the kind remarks of my colleague from New Jersey about my role in all of this. I do not want to make this a bouquet-tossing contest, but I do want the Senate to know and I want the country to know how important it has been that Senator Menendez has led this charge. As my colleague noted, human rights advocates, those who have been in the trenches in the fight against trafficking, have come together to work with us. Senator Menendez, since our debate in the committee, has led this fight. At that time, colleagues, the committee approved an important amendment to ensure that trade agreements with countries that drop the ball on trafficking get no special privileges here in the Congress. The reason that my colleague has put all of this time and energy and passion into it is that he understands--everyone here, Democrats and Republicans--that human trafficking is a plague that must be fought at every opportunity. So what Senator Menendez and I have done over the last few weeks is to work together to try to find a practical way to further improve the language in this original amendment. What these alterations--really improvements--are going to do is to create a new process by which the President will report to the Congress on the concrete, specific steps other countries are taking to crack down on trafficking. I think--and we just got their statement--the Alliance to End Slavery and Trafficking, one of the leading groups that has been fighting this scourge the hardest, has just summed up--I just got this a few minutes ago--what the Menendez effort is all about. A test, the organization has called it, and I quote here, and describes it as a ``positive step forward'' in the fight to combat human trafficking. When we take their statement with the fact that Senator Menendez has brought the State Department on board, I think with what we are showing--and this has been a major theme, frankly, of what I have sought to do over these many months, negotiating with Chairman Hatch and colleagues, is to try to make sure that we come up with policies that demonstrate that there is a new era of trade policy afoot, a new era when trade is done right. Because of the good work of my colleague from New Jersey, the amendment that we will be offering here, under my colleague's leadership, is a demonstration that we can do trade right, that we can do everything possible to eradicate this plague that so many around the world have mobilized to address. I congratulate my colleague for his efforts. Colleagues should note that this would not have happened had it not been for Senator Menendez. This was a matter that certainly colleagues felt very strongly about. People said: Oh, the whole debate is over. It cannot be resolved. Senator Menendez said: There is a way to bring people together. I congratulate my colleague for putting this together. I look forward to voting on it later tonight, I hope. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. WYDEN

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, on behalf of Senator Warren, I call up amendment No. 1327.

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, on behalf of Senator Shaheen, I call up her amendment, which is amendment No. 1227.

Mr. WYDEN. Madam President, before he leaves the floor, I just wish to respond to a couple of the points made by our colleague from Alabama, because he brings up issues that Chairman Hatch and I talked a great deal about during the discussion of this proposal. I would just like to respond very specifically to some of the concerns raised by the Senator, my friend from Alabama. My friend from Alabama said there would be no scrutiny--those were his words--of this particular agreement, and that it would be passed through as quickly as possible without any discussions. Now, that certainly is an area where I have been very concerned. Chairman Hatch has been concerned that there hasn't been enough discussion in the past. So Chairman Hatch and I have changed this, and I want to be very clear what is going to happen now. First, for a full 60 days before the President of the United States signs an agreement--starting with TPP, the Trans-Pacific Partnership-- it would have to be made public for those full 60 days before the President signs it. Then after that, there would be close to 2 additional months when the American people would have the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, or any other, in their hands before anyone casts a vote on an actual agreement on the floor of the Senate or in the other body, in the House of Representatives. So as to this idea that my friend from Alabama has said, that there wouldn't be any scrutiny of anything, we are starting to get a little flack that it would be out there for too long before people started voting. But what this----

Mr. WYDEN. If I could just finish my statement.

Mr. WYDEN. I was happy to listen to my colleague. What this means is the people of Alabama, Iowa, Oregon, and everywhere else could come to one of our townhall meetings, have the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement in our lap, and ask questions of their elected representatives about a trade agreement for close to 4 months before it was voted on here or in the other body. I am going to have to leave for a meeting to talk again about how we are going to see if we can find some common ground, but I do want to address one other point that my colleague made, and that deals with this question of middle-class wages. My colleague and I agree completely that middle-class people are hurting. There is no question about it. We have millions of middle- class people in this country walking an economic tightrope, balancing their food bill against their fuel bill and their fuel bill against their housing bill--no question about that. The difference of opinion here, between two Senators who enjoy each other's company, is that my colleague from Alabama says the principal problem is trade--that trade is the reason for this. Respectfully, the data from the Department of Commerce shows that export jobs--which is the focus of this bill and the focus of trade done right--pay better than do the nontrade jobs because they have a value-added kind of benefit to them. That is why--and I note for my friend from Alabama, who cares a great deal about the steel industry--the steel industry sent a letter to Chairman Hatch and me saying they were for this. The American steel industry sent a letter to Chairman Hatch and me saying they were for this because they know this is connected to producing more high-skilled, high-wage jobs, particularly in manufacturing, where my State is a leader. So the question then becomes this: What are the big challenges? Certainly, technology is one, and globalization is one. Chairman Hatch and I have talked about flawed tax policy. I think it is particularly ominous that the tax breaks go for shipping jobs overseas rather than rewarding the manufacturers and those who produce what I call ``red, white, and blue'' jobs. But during the time that I have here on the floor, I am going to be talking about the differences between this trade promotion act proposal and the last one of 2002. Nothing could illustrate the differences more than the new requirements for transparency and opportunity for the American people to weigh in. The facts are that, as a result of what Chairman Hatch and the Finance Committee have put together, the American people, before a vote is cast--before a vote is cast on a trade agreement here on the floor of the Senate or on the floor of the other body, the American people are going to have those trade agreements in their hands for pretty close to 4 months. If my colleague wants to ask a question, I am happy to yield my time to him.

Mr. WYDEN. Madam President, we are a little bit behind and our colleagues have been very patient. I ask unanimous consent that Senator Peters be able to speak briefly about one of his constituents who had a tragic death, followed by our colleague, Senator Lankford from Oklahoma. I ask unanimous consent that those Senators be allowed to speak in that order.

Mr. WYDEN. Reserving the right to object. I have no intent to object at this point. I just want to say this, to me, seems like a very balanced package. We have three amendments on each side raising important issues. Chairman Hatch has indicated, and I support him on this, that we are ready to go again first thing in the morning. I think that is what it is going to take to ensure that all sides feel that they have a chance to have their major concerns aired, have their amendments actually voted on. I withdraw my reservation and I commend Chairman Hatch for working with us cooperatively so we can have this balanced package go forward. With that, I withdraw my reservation.

Mr. WYDEN. Madam President, first, let me thank Chairman Hatch for our partnership over these many months, and let me be clear at the outset that I agree with much of what Chairman Hatch has said. What I would like to start with is what I think is the bedrock principle of this debate about trade and put it all straightforward and upfront; that is, this is about trade done right. This is not the trade policy of the 1990s. This is not the NAFTA playbook. It is not even the 2002 TPA package. I realize the Presiding Officer was not in the Senate at that time. After my opening remarks, I am going to start outlining the 30 progressive changes in the 2015 TPA package that were not in the 2002 program to show how different this trade policy will be. The point of what I have started with--this focus on trade done right--is to drive home the potential for more good-paying jobs for our workers. This would be true in Oregon, Utah, Iowa, and across the land. In my State, one out of five jobs revolves around exports. The export jobs often pay better than do the nontrade jobs. The reason I bring this up is I do not think there is any more pressing economic issue in our country than finding ways to increase wages for Americans and particularly the middle class and those who aspire to be middle class. The facts demonstrate clearly that the export jobs often pay better than do the nonexport jobs. The reason that is the case is because there is often a very large value-added component. There is increased productivity. The fact is, when we grow things in Iowa or Oregon or any other part of the country and make things in America and we add value to them, then we can ship them somewhere. What the Department of Commerce has found in a number of their analyses is that those export-related jobs often pay better than do the nonexport jobs. The reason I am starting with this is that this is particularly relevant given the potential market that is out there for the people of Oregon, Iowa, and every other part of our country. The analysis shows that by 2025, there are going to be about 1 billion middle-class consumers in the developing world--1 billion people with a significant amount of disposable income. I think they want to buy the Oregon brand, they want to buy the American brand. They are going to be interested in buying our computers. They are going to want to buy our wine and agricultural products. They are going to buy our helicopters. They are going to buy our planes. They are going to buy a whole host of products. The question is, Are Americans going to reap the fruit of those export opportunities? That, fundamentally, is what this is all about with respect to exports and particularly employment opportunities. The reality is that our markets are basically open, but a lot of the countries that are part of the region we are looking at for the first agreement--what is called the Trans-Pacific Partnership--have markets that are much more closed. They have double- and triple-digit tariffs. I suspect the Presiding Officer is very concerned about the double- and triple-digit tariffs on agricultural commodities. Certainly, the people of Oregon are very concerned about the consequences of those huge tariffs on our agricultural goods. So, as we start this discussion, right at the center is this focus on what I call trade done right and my view that trade done right can create an enormous array of economic opportunities for hard-working middle-class Americans who deserve to have us come up with policies that shape a better future for them rather than the alternative. Make no mistake about the alternative. If we walk off the field, China comes onto the field and China says: Fine; we are happy to write the rules. To me--I am going to outline this--what Chairman Hatch and I and others have produced is a policy that will force standards up as opposed to much of what critics say about past trade policies, that they drive--it is a race to the bottom, that it drives standards down. This is a piece of legislation which is going to drive up standards. With that, I am going to start outlining the differences between the 2015 TPA package and the 2002 TPA package. I am going to start with the requirement for labor, the environment, and affordable medicines. In 2002, there was no requirement for trading partners' laws to comply with core international labor standards. Let me repeat that. In 2002--more than a dozen years ago--there was no requirement for trading partners' laws to comply with core international labor standards. Under the package Chairman Hatch and our colleagues and I on the Finance Committee have produced, trading partners must adopt and maintain core international labor standards, and there are trade sanctions if they do not comply. It could not be more different--the rules from 2002 TPA and the rules for 2015 under what Chairman Hatch and I and others on the Finance Committee insisted on. Let's talk about the environment. I mentioned labor first. Let's talk about the environment. In 2002, there was no requirement for trading partners' laws to comply with common multilateral environmental agreements. In 2015, under the bipartisan Finance package, trading partners must adopt and maintain common multilateral environmental agreements, and there are trade sanctions if they do not comply. Again, 2002 and 2015--the differences could not be more stark with respect to environmental protection. With respect to affordable medicines, in 2002, there were no provisions balancing intellectual property protections to ensure access to medicines for developing countries. In 2015, there are directives for trade agreements to promote access to medicine and foster innovation. I do want to yield to the distinguished majority leader, but I wanted to begin this debate--particularly when Chairman Hatch is on the floor--by highlighting the differences between 2002 and 2015, particularly in areas so important to the American people, such as labor, environmental protection, and access to medicines. I know we all want to hear from the distinguished majority leader. I yield the floor.

Mr. WYDEN

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the following staff of the Finance Committee be allowed on the Senate floor for the remainder of this week: Nikesh Patel and Jennifer Kay.

Mr. WYDEN

Mr. WYDEN. I thank my colleague. I will be very brief.

Mr. WYDEN. I thank the Senator. I am going to wrap up as we move to this first vote in a few minutes and come back to what this debate is all about. We are starting, of course, with the issue of trade enforcement, but the big challenge is to show this country that we are putting in place a modern trade policy, a trade policy that sets aside once and for all the NAFTA playbook of the 1990s. This overall package will usher in a new and modern American trade policy. It must start with a tough, robust, effective trade enforcement package, many of the details of which I have outlined here this morning. It is time also--and this will be part of our early work--to upgrade and renew our trade preference programs. The businesses and workers who rely on these programs are waiting for this Congress to act. The first of these proposals enhances and extends the African Growth and Opportunity Act, referred to as AGOA. This has been the core of a close economic partnership between our country and a host of African nations for more than a decade. The proposal before the Senate will update that partnership in a way that is positive for all involved. Back in the 1990s--once again returning to this theme, the NAFTA era--the United States had no meaningful trade policies to help African nations facing profound economic hardship climb back from the brink. This renewal of the AGOA law takes the program to the next level. AGOA will be simpler for businesses to use. There will be less redtape to worry about. African countries will be encouraged to zero in on strategies that can make the program more effective. It will be easier for the United States to crack down on the bad actors and verify that countries stay strictly in line with the criteria for eligibility. Most importantly, the proposal gives all concerned--workers, businesses, countries, and investors--a decade of certainty. I am a real fan of this program. I believe it works for our country, for Sub-Saharan Africa, and it ought to be a cornerstone of our economic policy in the region. The second part of this package of programs renews the program known as the generalized system of preferences. This is an economic win-win because it is a shot in the arm for developing countries, and it is a major boost for American manufacturers, including hundreds of them in my home State. One of those businesses in Oregon is Stackhouse Athletic in Salem, which will not only be able to create new jobs, they will be able to offer health benefits to their workers. The extension of GSP will save American businesses an estimated $2 million a day by reducing tariffs. The GSP program expired nearly 2 years ago. As a result, businesses in my home State of Oregon paid an extra $4.9 million in tariffs. Renewing GSP would correct that issue and support as many as 80,000 jobs with manufacturers, ports, farmers, and retail stores. That program would be extended by this legislation through 2017. Finally, the Senate has an opportunity with this legislation to reaffirm our economic commitment to Haiti, one of our closest and most disadvantaged neighbors in the world. In my view, Senator Nelson of Florida has done very important work in this area. He has been our leader on this issue, and there is bipartisan understanding that now is the right time to extend the Haiti trade preferences to line them up with AGOA. These Haiti preferences also did not exist in the NAFTA era. Together, they support as many as 30,000 jobs in that country, and they help to drive investment and lift Haiti's economy in the long term. I am confident the Senate will come together to extend this package of preference programs because they make economic sense for America, and they strengthen our ties with the developing countries around the world. I urge my colleagues to support this legislation with our first vote. I will close by saying that today we begin to turn the corner on a fresh, modern trade policy for the times, a policy very different from the trade policy of the 1990s, the NAFTA era. Let's begin this effort-- begin this effort--for a new 21st-century trade policy by passing the legislation we will be considering shortly, both parts. Mr. President, I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I also ask unanimous consent to be able to equally divide the time spent in quorum calls.

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, today the Senate is formally kicking off the trade debate here in the Senate. What I intend to do, starting today and in the days ahead, is to come back to what I think needs to be the central statement of this discussion; that is, the NAFTA playbook. The playbook for trade in the 1990s is gone. It is a new day in trade policy. So I have summarized why the trade promotion act is not the trade policy of the 1990s and is not the North American Free Trade Agreement. What we are going to do today is essentially start with the question of how vigorous trade enforcement ought to be at the forefront of America's trade policy in 2015 and beyond, and how our new approach on enforcement is different than the policy of the 1990s. The reality is, we can pass trade agreements full of lofty goals and principles. You can amass all of the enforcement ideas you might want, but it does not do any good if you do not have real enforcement tools and you make sure that they are not locked in a shed. In my view, that has been happening for way, way too long. The status quo on trade enforcement simply no longer does the job. As I have listened for many months to Senators on both sides of the aisle, I believe there is widespread recognition that our approach to trade, particularly trade enforcement, has to change, because without that change, we are not going to have the best possible path to creating more good-paying jobs for our people in a modern and globally competitive economy. The bottom line is that those trade policies in the 1990s did very little--really nothing--to ensure strong enforcement of our trade laws to protect the American worker from the misdeeds of trade cheats. This bill is designed to take on the universe of aggressive tactics that our competitors have used. It upgrades trade enforcement laws to meet today's challenges. What we have seen in recent years is that there are some overseas who play cat-and-mouse games with our Customs agents, using shell companies, fraudulent records, and sophisticated schemes. Then they bully--bully--American businesses into relocating factories and jobs or surrendering valuable intellectual property. Too often our companies are spied on, and trade enforcers may, in effect, be victimized by those who steal secrets and dodge accountability. Our competitors often mask their activities by obscuring paper trails and perpetrating outright fraud. Now, our challenge--and I know my colleague the Presiding Officer has seen this as a member of the Finance Committee--is to get out in front of these schemes that I have just described. The enforcement legislation before the Senate is about guaranteeing that the United States has a queen on the chess board, no matter what competitive tactic it faces. That starts with a proposal I first offered years ago called the ENFORCE Act. Now, the North American Free Trade Agreement did nothing to stop foreign companies that cheat and evade duties by concealing their identities and shipping their products on untraceable routes. That is the way it used to be. That is why this legislation is not the North American Free Trade Agreement. The ENFORCE Act is going to give our Customs agents more tools aimed at cracking down on the behavior I have just outlined. Another major upgrade, something else that did not exist during those NAFTA days, is what I call an unfair trade alert. The new alert system would set off the warning bells long before the damage is done, when American jobs and exports come under threat. One of the big fears we hear today is that our enforcers are incapable of stopping the trade cheats before it is too late. By the time somebody in Washington catches on to the newest unfair threat to undercut an American business, the plant has been shuttered, the factory lights are out, and the workers' lives have been turned upside down. In a lot of cases, if you are talking about the small towns that dot the landscape of Oregon and elsewhere, that abandoned facility might have been the beating heart of an entire community. The slow pace of action in Washington, DC, should never be the reason Americans lose their jobs. The unfair trade alert--that was not part of the 1990s; that was not part of NAFTA. It is going to be part of our current policy today, helping our companies, helping our workers get there before it is too late. Next, the Congress is going to lay down clear priorities for our trade enforcers, priorities that are centered on jobs and economic growth. There is going to be more accountability and follow-through baked into our enforcement system. In years past, trade debate in the Congress used to come down to a simple transaction of trade promotion authority for trade adjustment assistance. What I said in developing this package of bills and what more than a dozen protrade Democrats said on Tuesday and Wednesday of this week was that the Senate needed to aim higher. The status quo was not good enough. In particular, it was not good enough in terms of enforcing the laws that are on the books. My guess is that in Pennsylvania and everywhere else--because I certainly hear it in Oregon--people say-- particularly those of us who are protrade and want to tap these global markets: I hear you are talking about new trade agreements. How about enforcing the laws that are on the books? What I started this morning--and I will be back again and again between now and the end of this debate--is to talk about why this is a very different approach than the approach taken in the 1990s. Tough, robust, effective enforcement of our trade laws is right at the core of a new and modern trade policy. It is a major part of what I call trade done right. It is how you guarantee that trade gives everybody in America a chance to get ahead. Those are propositions, in my view, that deserve strong, bipartisan support in the Senate, and I strongly urge my colleagues to support this trade enforcement law package. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Democratic side have 20 minutes of the debate time remaining prior to noon.

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, before the Senator leaves the floor, I wish to also note that Senator Schumer has provided leadership on another very important enforcement issue. He introduced the committee to something a number of years ago known as honey laundering. What this involved was, in effect, we set up a sting operation. In particular, with respect to Senator Schumer's constituents and his interest in tough enforcement of the trade laws, the Chinese, as my colleagues will recall, were found guilty of unfair trading practices. In effect, they would just ship honey through other countries, such as Indonesia. I want my colleague to know I am going to continue to work with him on a variety of issues.

Mr. WYDEN. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. WYDEN

Mr. WYDEN. Madam President, before I speak on the trade legislation-- and the distinguished chairman of the committee is on the floor as well--I wish to note that the Finance Committee, under the leadership of Chairman Hatch, has already passed a version of this important legislation. Now we have taken up the House bill--our companion legislation. I congratulate both of my colleagues. Senator Shaheen has talked to me about this a number of times. I know Senator Ayotte is very interested in it as well. I congratulate both of them.

Mr. WYDEN

Mr. WYDEN. Madam President, if I could make my remarks about trade, Chairman Hatch has graciously allowed me to make a few comments at this time.

Mr. WYDEN. Madam President, with the votes that have been cast today in the Senate, the Senate has begun to develop a powerful and bipartisan message that the trade policy of the 1990s will be unacceptable in 2015. The Customs and Enforcement package passed this morning goes a long way toward breaking new ground. We will be talking about the final two elements of the overall trade package, trade promotion authority, and trade adjustment assistance. But until we are done with this debate, I will be referring to the chart next to me because what we will be outlining are all of the specific areas that demonstrate that this legislation is going to finally put the 1990s and NAFTA in the rearview mirror and fix many of its flaws. For example, in the NAFTA era, American priorities, like rights for working families and environmental protection, were an afterthought, and they were stuck in unenforceable side agreements. With this legislation, they will be bedrock elements of future trade agreements. Back in those NAFTA days, the United States pretty much just asked our trading partners to enforce their own labor and environmental laws, and then we sort of hoped for the best. The trade promotion act says that if a trading partner's laws fall short, they are going to be required to pass new laws to fix the problem, and for the first time, these labor and environmental protections will be fully enforceable, enforceable because they are backed by the threat of trade sanctions. So the NAFTA-era policies, colleagues, had no teeth. In effect, this legislation raises the global bar on labor rights and environmental protection. We are going to hear a lot about how somehow this is just more of the same, and it is going to promote a race to the bottom. What we intend to spell out in the days ahead is how this creates new momentum to push our standards up, rather than promote a race to the bottom. For the first time, I wish to note--with the support of our colleagues, the outstanding work done by our colleague from Maryland, Ben Cardin--now human rights will be a negotiating objective for our future trade agreements. Back in the NAFTA era, the United States fought for intellectual property protection for drugmakers, but nobody was trying to do much of anything to look for people stuck in hardship around the world who needed access to affordable medicine. That also will change with this legislation. The old NAFTA playbook was written in a time when cell phones were about as big as bricks and Internet commerce was still a dream. Today, it is right at the heart of our economy. So our new approach to trade is going to help cement American leadership in the digital economy. Even now, in 2015, you have repressive governments in China, Russia, and elsewhere building digital walls that block the free flow of information and commerce online. If that trend continues, it would chop the Internet up into small, country-sized pieces. In my view, the Internet is the shipping lane of the 21st century, and products sent around the world in bits and bytes are just as important as products packaged into shipping containers and sent across the oceans. I strongly believe this is the best chance to fix what NAFTA got wrong and introduce a new day in American trade policy. The only way for our country to defend an open Internet, promote access to affordable medicine, protect our values on labor standards, environmental protections, and human rights is to fight for them as part of our trade negotiations. Certainly nobody else is going to pick up the American banner and fight for those kinds of progressive American values in the way we can. In fact, it is my view that if our country fails to lead the way, it will be China that steps in to write rules, rules that very likely could hurt American workers and our exporters. So we have to engage with modern, progressive trade policies and with a higher bar for trade agreements. I recognize there are skeptics with doubts about trade deals and the process of moving them through Congress. I think we can still take steps to try to reach out to those who have been critical about past trade policy, find common ground, and lock those new policies into the future way in which we make a trade law. I have indicated for many months that I think those who are skeptical about our trade policies have a valid point when they talk about the excessive secrecy that has so often accompanied much of the trade discussion. My view has been, if you believe strongly in the benefits of trade--and particularly those high-skilled, high-wage export jobs, and you want more of them--why in the world would you want to have all of this secrecy that just makes Americans so aware of the fact that something isn't coming to light? They are wondering whether there is a reason something has been hidden. Now, it has been too common that Oregonians and other Americans have no way of knowing what is on the table in trade talks or how they would be affected. That was a problem with NAFTA, and it has been a problem that has continued over the years. There is no question about the need for protecting some of the details in our trade negotiations. I often say at a townhall meeting that nobody is talking about giving out the secret sauce in some particular product. But today Americans have reasonable expectations to be able to fire up their computer, click open their browser, and learn about the public policies that affect them and their families. It is time to close the book on those days when Americans were kept in the dark on trade. The reality is, under the old playbook, that NAFTA playbook, the President could be handed an agreement for signature and put pen to paper right away. So nothing illustrates better than the changes that Chairman Hatch, I, and Chairman Ryan have worked on to put in place a fresh set of policies to ensure that the American people are no longer in the dark with respect to trade. Under this legislation, the President, by law, will have to make the full text of trade deals public for 60 days before a President can sign them. When you factor in the Congress, agreements would be public for as many as 100 days before they are voted on and often more. So what that means is, if you live in West Virginia, Utah, Oregon or Alaska, you will be able to come to one of our community meetings and have in your hands the trade agreement, starting with the Trans-Pacific Partnership, for more than 3 months before your Senator or your Member of the House has cast a vote on them. For more than 3 months, the American people will have the actual text, starting with the Trans- Pacific Partnership agreement. I think that is a long overdue change. I will say, that is a very dramatic change. That is part of the reason why I note that this TPA is certainly not one that resembles the NAFTA era on transparency. Finally, on the transparency front, long before the deals are finalized, our trade officials would be required to give detailed and public updates on what is at stake in the negotiations. Every Member of Congress will have access to the full text, from beginning to end, and the doors will be open for Members to attend negotiating sessions and briefings. Perhaps the most important new tool in this legislation is a new procedure for hitting the brakes on bad trade deals before they reach the Senate or House floor. If a trade deal doesn't meet the high bar the Congress sets under this progressive, modern approach, it will be a whole lot easier to shut it down. It is my view that protecting that ability makes the process more democratic, and all of those upgrades will close the door on the 1990s and NAFTA once and for all. The second matter at hand now is the support system for American workers known as trade adjustment assistance, and paired with that program is the health coverage tax credit. When times are tough for workers and industries affected by trade, the health coverage credit guarantees that those persons and their families will still be able to see their doctors. And trade adjustment assistance is there to help with job training and financial support. It is a lifeline for more than 100,000 Americans today, including 3,000 in Oregon, and it helps to guarantee that those workers and their families have a springboard to a new set of opportunities where they can have for themselves and their families a new opportunity for good-paying jobs and a chance to get ahead. The Trade Adjustment Assistance Program has spent the last few years working at reduced capacity. That would change with this legislation. Trade adjustment assistance would be back at full strength in the year 2021 with a level of funding the administration says will cover everybody who qualifies. Once again the program would bring service workers into the mix because it is not just manufacturing employees who face competition from abroad. Trade adjustment assistance takes into account competition that comes from anywhere, including China and India, instead of just a select list of countries. I want to be clear that the Senate is not voting today to give the green light to the Trans-Pacific Partnership or any other trade agreement. As I see it, this is legislation which raises the bar for trade deals and challenges our negotiators to meet it. It will go further than ever before in stripping the secrecy out of trade policy and will provide new accountability by protecting our ability to slam the brakes on trade deals that don't work for our hard-working middle class. When you put these vast improvements together with a next-level enforcement system, it is my view that you have a long-overdue progressive, modern approach that sets aside the NAFTA playbook. This is a plan which will help get trade done right so that it works better for all Americans, whether they are a service professional, a business owner, or a worker who punches the time clock at the end of the day. I will close with just a short statement about why this is especially timely right now. All the evidence suggests that in 2025 there are going to be 1 billion middle-class workers in the developing world. These are going to be workers with money to spend. They are going to buy computers and helicopters and bicycles, their companies will buy planes, and the list goes on and on. It is my hope and I think the hope of every Member of the Senate that we have a trade policy that ensures our workers can have the opportunity to export what we make here and what we grow here--the products of the United States--to this 1- billion-person middle-class market. Let's take this opportunity--a bipartisan opportunity--to have a fresh new trade policy that increases the prospect of having American workers, who are the best and most competitive workers on the planet, sell the goods and services they make and deliver them to that enormous market that wants to buy American, wants to buy Oregon. It just seems to me to be obvious that we should take the opportunity to tap the potential of that market. With that, Madam President, I yield the floor.