Space, residents push back against TPP

TRENTON — Today, residents of Northwest New Jersey traveled to the State House in Trenton to advocate to members of the Assembly Labor Committee and other Assembly Members the need to pass a bill which memorializes Congress and the President to reform federal trade policy.
Assemblyman Parker Space, R-Sussex, Warren, Morris, himself a member of the Labor Committee welcomed his constituents to Trenton and to show his support on the issue.
“The way the United States negotiates and enters trade agreements garnered a lot of attention from the campaigns of both President-Elect Donald Trump and Senator Bernie Sanders to organizations that mostly do not see eye to eye with each other like Eagle Forum and many TEA Party groups to labor unions and Public Citizen,” Space stated. “I believe, as do my friends and neighbors who came to the State House today, that the time is now for the Assembly to take a stand against the way trade agreements like NAFTA and GATT, which created the World Trade Organization, have been negotiated and passed by our federal government.”
The bipartisan resolution calls on Congress and the President to reform federal trade policy in the following ways:
Improve the process of consultation between the Federal Government and the states;
Provide for state input into trade negotiations by allowing a state to give informed consent or to opt out if bound by nontariff provisions in a trade agreement and providing that a state is not bound to those provisions without consent from its legislature;
Provide state-level economic analysis of trade data and legal analysis on the effect of trade on state laws;
Form a new nonpartisan federal-state international trade policy commission to keep states informed about ongoing negotiations and information;
Require the United States Trade Representative to communicate with states in better ways than the current, insufficient state point of contact system; and
Provide that no state law subject to trade agreement provisions regarding investment, procurement, or services may be challenged by a foreign company or country as an unfair barrier to trade unless the state specifically makes the law subject to such challenges.
Wendy Goetz, a resident of Frelinghuysen, has been leading a grassroots movement in Northwest New Jersey against unfair trade deals including the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement, which has been scrapped by Congress for now.
“Activists here have been holding rallies and have been able to get municipalities to pass resolutions against the TPP,” Goetz. “Now it is time to get the Assembly to take a stand against unfair trade agreements.”
Space and Goetz noted that the Senate passed an almost identical resolution in 2012 (SR-29) by a voice vote without opposition.
Goetz has held 50 #NoTPPTuesday vigils on the Newton Green since last year. Through Goetz’s efforts, the municipalities of Frelinghuysen, Hampton (Sussex County), and Hardwick passed resolutions opposing the TPP.
“Grassroots activism does work,” Space said. “The TPP was not passed when every pundit thought it would sail through Congress. And through these same efforts, we will get AR-79 passed.”