President Obama’s proposed Asian free-trade deal was crumbling on the left and right Tuesday, with progressives denouncing his decision to promote the pact at a firm with a history of exploiting sweatshop labor, and a rift widening with Speaker John A. Boehner over the White House’s inability to muster Democratic votes for the deal.
Liberals expressed anger at Mr. Obama’s decision to decision to promote Trans-Pacific Partnership on Friday at the Oregon headquarters of Nike, a firm with a history of profiting from Asian sweatshops.
Lori Wallach, director of Public Citizens’ global trade watch, said the president’s move is so tone-deaf to Democrats’ concerns that she “gasped” when she heard the White House had scheduled the event.
“As he tries to sell a trade deal that many believe would lead to American job offshoring and lower wages, why would the president honor a firm that has grown and profited not by creating American jobs, but by producing in offshore sweatshops with rock bottom wages and terrible labor conditions?” Ms. Wallach asked.
The liberal group Campaign for America’s Future also blasted the decision to hold a presidential event at Nike, calling the company “among the very worst offenders” on labor standards.
“Their record of abusive labor practices spans two decades,” the group told supporters in an email. “The only thing that has changed is a substantial investment in a public relations snow job. So why is President Obama appearing at a Nike event on [Friday]?”
The backlash on the left is building just as Mr. Obama is making personal appeals to Democratic lawmakers to grant him trade-promotion authority, which would help him speed up negotiations on the massive trade deal with 11 other Pacific rim nations. The agreement is the key economic initiative of Mr. Obama’s second term and the centerpiece of his foreign policy “pivot” toward Asia.
Most Republicans support giving Mr. Obama trade-promotion authority. But Mr. Boehner, Ohio Republican, said Sunday that the White House needs help from Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton to get enough Democrats on board to pass the legislation.
The White House fired back Tuesday, with presidential press secretary Josh Earnest telling reporters that Mr. Boehner’s suggestion to seek help from Mrs. Clinton is “a pretty desperate act.”
“I think in the mind of the president, it’s the responsibility of the speaker of the House to do his job and to pull together the votes that he needs to advance his agenda,” Mr. Earnest said. “The good news is, is that he has a Democratic president who shares at least one of those priorities and a Democratic president who signaled a willingness to make the case to members of Congress in his own party about why they should support bipartisan trade promotion authority legislation.”
Mr. Boehner’s office also hinted that Mrs. Clinton could do a better job than the president of persuading Democrats.
“This White House has failed to convince a single Democrat leader in Congress to stand with the president on trade,” said Boehner spokesman Cory Fritz. “If Hillary Clinton can do a better job of helping get Democrats to join with Republicans to pass pro-growth trade agreements, the president ought to get her on the phone right now.”
The speaker has said he’ll need about 50 House Democrats to support trade-promotion authority. But Rep. James Clyburn of South Carolina, a member of the House Democrat leadership, said this week he’s not sure if there are even 20 votes out of 188 House Democrats in favor of it.
The president promises that raising labor standards will be a key feature of the TPP, but the renewed criticism Tuesday over his planned visit to Nike headquarters showed that progressives are still wary that the deal could lead to more outsourcing and U.S. job losses.
The Campaign for America’s Future asked supporters for $10 contributions to fight the TPP, saying it plans to blitz “vulnerable” lawmakers on Capitol Hill with tens of thousands of phone calls and hundreds of thousands of emails over the next few weeks.
“It’s not too late to stop this,” the group said.
After years of accusations that it exploited child labor and profited from low wages overseas, Nike has enacted a series of measures to redeem its image, including audits of its manufacturing shops and the company’s creation of a nonprofit group to maintain certain labor standards.
Mr. Earnest said last week defended the decision for Mr. Obama to visit Nike headquarters, saying the president wants to emphasize the need for better labor standards in the TPP. Nike manufactured about 40 percent of its athletic shoes last year in Vietnam, which would be a partner in the trade agreement.
“The president believes that by raising labor standards and raising environmental standards in Southeast Asia principally, but all throughout the Asia-Pacific region, that will level the playing field for American businesses,” Mr. Earnest said. “And no longer will companies be able to gain an unfair advantage by capitalizing on those low labor standards.”
⦁ Ben Wolfgang contributed to this report.
• Dave Boyer can be reached at dboyer@washingtontimes.com.
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