White House Still Set on 2016 Vote on TPP Despite Opposition in Congress
White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest indicated that the Obama administration hasn't given up on 2016 congressional approval of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, despite a recent remark from Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., that Congress won’t deliberate a vote on the trade deal in 2016 (see 1608260022). The president plans to make the case during the upcoming G-20 Leaders Summit in Hangzhou, China, that U.S. ratification is still possible this year (here), Earnest said. "I think there is a reservoir of support across the country that we can draw from, but there has long been historic opposition to these kind of trade agreements, certainly from the Democratic Party, but among some elements from the Republican Party, too," Earnest said during an Aug. 29 press briefing. "And so the president is going to make a strong case that we have made progress, and that there is a path for us to get this done before the president leaves office."
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White House spokesman Ben Rhodes during the press briefing also said the next president's administration will be in a much stronger strategic and diplomatic position under TPP than without it. "If you were taking office, you would be in a much stronger position if you had the United States having established that it will be setting the rules of the road through this multilateral trade agreement and will have sent a signal that we’re present in the Asia-Pacific," Rhodes said. "That will be of enormous benefit, we believe, to the next administration."
Meanwhile, TPP opponents Sens. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., and Bernie Sanders, D-Vt., applauded McConnell's statement that Congress won't consider the deal for a vote in 2016. “It’s rare for me to agree with Senator McConnell, but in this case he made absolutely the right decision,” Merkley said (here). “The TPP is a flawed trade deal that fails our workers and is opposed by both major party presidential nominees. Pushing it through at the last minute before a new administration would simply be wrong.” Senate and House Democratic party leadership should go on the record in opposing the TPP during the upcoming “lame-duck” session of Congress and beyond, said Sanders (here), who caucuses with Senate Democrats. “This treaty is opposed by every trade union in the country and virtually the entire grassroots base of the Democratic Party,” Sanders said. “We need to defeat this treaty and fundamentally rewrite our trade policies to create good-paying jobs in this country and throughout the world and end the race to the bottom.”