By Brandon Moseley
Alabama Political Reporter
Thursday, June 11, US Senator Jeff Sessions (R-Alabama) went on the nationally syndicated radio show of conservative host Laura Ingraham, to blast efforts to give the President of the United States fast track authority, Trade Promotion Authority (TPA), to finish the controversial Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement. Sen. Sessions said that the TPP agreement does not serve the best interests of working Americans.
Sen. Sessions said that Republicans, “Need to be listening to the American people. They are hurting now. Things are not going well. A lot of the trade agreements that we’ve supported in the past have not worked as promised. We need to be focused don things that the people care about. The polling data shows that they don’t’ care about this trade deal, but I believe the polling data shows that American people want an immigration policy that serves their interests, they want a trade policy that serves their interests, and they question whether the masters of the universe are giving them that. In fact, they think they’re not giving them that. So, I think Republicans do need to alter our methods, not just words, but to actually advocate policies that swing voters, working Americans feel help them, and that in a way, says to the American people we get it, we hear you, things haven’t been going well, and we’re going to change in the future. I think that could get a huge surge of voters because they don’t like this big government, statist, internationalist, Democratic agenda.”
Sen. Sessions told Laura Ingraham, “Well, a good bit of it is in the secret documents that people can only see in the closed rooms… It creates an international organization, something like the beginning of a European Union. The nations come together, they meet regularly, the agreement is a living agreement that creates it, and they can alter the nature of their entity any time the members choose. And, it has the power to alter American policy. This is not something, I think, the American people would support if they knew. And that’s all in addition to the basic trade agreement that would be a part of this also.”
Sen. Sessions continued, “The threat is mostly to working Americans, that’s where the damage might be from an unwise agreement. President Obama, I believe, has never been really interested in trade, Laura, I think what his legacy vision is he’s created another monumental, trans-pacific organization that has Australia, Vietnam, all in this. And, it has the ability to add new members and he’s even talked about adding China into this agreement. I think it’s a huge, historic event that there’s no way this Republican Congress should give this to the president. We ought to know everything there is about it, lawyers ought to explain every word that’s in it, we need to know precisely what it is that’s occurring. And, I don’t believe, frankly, that it ought to be given to this president who’s already shown he’s not bound by law when it comes to promoting his agenda.”
Sen. Sessions told Ms. Ingraham, “First, this vote to go forward with this amounts to a pre-approval of the outline, and really more than an outline, of the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the trade deal. So, we are pre-approving it and we’re saying, Mr. President, go out and close the final deals on this and we’ll support you. So, when he comes back, Laura, you know what they’re going to say. You authorized this, he’s agreed to this, all these nations are going to be in an uproar, it’s going to embarrass us in front of the whole world, all that. If we’re going to object, it needs to be stopped now. We’ve never stopped an agreement after fast track has passed.”
TPA has already passed the US Senate where efforts by Sens. Sessions, Shelby (R-Alabama) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Massachusetts) to defeat the controversial package of new presidential powers was defeated by a bipartisan coalition of Senators who support the White House position.
In the US House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner and former GOP VP candidate Paul Ryan (R-Wisconsin) are pushing the legislation on behalf of President Obama.
