The Senate is moving closer to blocking one of President Barack Obama’s biggest priorities in his remaining years in the White House: a massive trade deal.
Roughly 14 pro-trade Democrats emerged Tuesday afternoon from a meeting with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell saying they wouldn’t vote to take up the trade bill later in the day. They were unable to reach a deal with McConnell that would have added pro-worker provisions to the trade bill that many in the GOP see as unrelated and too costly.
Opposition to the measure, which would allow for quick approval of the 12-country free-trade agreement known as the Trans-Pacific Partnership, has been building among progressive Democrats for some time. But there was still hope at the White House that aggressive lobbying from Obama would be enough to cobble together votes needed to at least allow the Senate to debate the bill.
If the Senate blocks the measure, it will provide another reminder of Obama’s waning clout within his own party. Even Ron Wyden. who is a co-author of this bipartisan trade package, is going to effectively filibuster his own bill along with other Democrats in an attempt to force the GOP to address the worker provisions.
The tricky politics of trade have created unusual partnerships heading into the vote. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a liberal darling, and Sen. Rand Paul, a conservative running for the 2016 GOP presidential nomination, both oppose the measure.
“While Sen. Paul has always been a strong advocate of free trade, he is hesitant to give blanket authority on a trade agreement that has yet to be seen,” a Paul aide said.
Warren and her fellow progressives have long been an outspoken opponent of the bill for the same reason — that it largely removes Congress’ ability to weigh in on the deal until after it’s been negotiated, a process that critics say has been done in secret and in close cooperation with lobbyists and special interests.
Warren reiterated those complaints in an interview with NPR Tuesday morning.
“The way I see this, that’s a tilted process, and a tilted process yields a tilted result,” she said.
More broadly, progressives are wary of a new free-trade deal because they believe it would draw jobs overseas and hurt American workers. During a speech at the National Press Club on Tuesday, Warren gave voice to those concerns, warning that “this country is in real trouble.”
“We cannot continue to run this country for the top 10 percent. We can’t keep pushing through trade deals that benefit multi-national companies at the expense of workers,” she said.
“Government cannot continue to be the captive of the rich and the powerful. Working people cannot be forced to give up more and more as they get squeezed harder and harder.”