Splits are forming on the Right as conservatives grapple with the question of whether they should support President Obama’s international trade agenda.
Some groups are urging conservatives to support the principle of free trade, while others are declaring that they simply cannot trust Obama. The rest are remaining on the fence or have decided to steer clear of the issue.
That is a potential problem for Obama, who faces a difficult job selling his two major trade agenda items, Trade Promotion Authority legislation and the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a 12 Pacific Rim-nation trade deal, to Congress. Many Democratic lawmakers oppose both, fearing they will cost U.S. workers jobs and harm the environment. Liberal groups, especially organized labor, are lobbying hard to defeat Obama’s agenda.
This puts the president in the ironic position of having to rely on Republican support. House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., are backing the president but are expected to lose some GOP votes from members who are trade skeptics or distrustful of Obama. The president can ill afford to lose those GOP votes given the potential Democratic losses he already is facing. That means pressure from activist conservative groups could be an important factor in whether Congress approves the trade measures.
Trade Promotion Authority, also known as “Fast Track,” would prohibit Congress from amending trade deals, limiting it to a strict up or down vote. Presidents from Gerald Ford to George W. Bush have had versions of it, but the last one expired in 2007. Fast Track’s passage is widely seen as crucial to the Trans-Pacific Partnership’s chances in Congress. Lawmakers introduced a Fast Track bill last week and Obama has pushed Congress to take it up before he submits the Pacific deal.
Rick Manning, president of Americans for Limited Government, thinks trusting Obama on either measure is out of the question. “I don’t see how somebody can call themselves as a constitutional conservative and support giving Obama this enormous grant of power,” he told the Washington Examiner.
NumbersUSA, a group that favors restrictions on immigration, came out against Obama’s trade agenda last week, citing reports that the Pacific deal would include provisions allowing the White House to expand guest worker programs without congressional approval. NumbersUSA said it would score a vote for Fast Track in its annual congressional rankings.
The groups conceded that their opposition put them on the same side of the issue as labor and environmental groups, but shrugged it off. Manning said the liberal groups had “stumbled across” an issue in which they were correct. “We haven’t had any contact with them,” he added.
Representatives from other conservative groups, speaking off the record, said they were torn. All said they supported trade in principle but several expressed a concern that Fast Track would be tied to some other, more liberal, piece of legislation to build Democratic support in Congress. One said that if they could be certain that Fast Track would be voted on as a stand-alone bill they would “be all for it” but didn’t know if that would happen.
Pro-trade groups on the Right are trying to rally support. A coalition led by Americans for Tax Reform issued a statement Tuesday afternoon calling on Congress to pass Trade Promotion Authority. “Without it, there is little hope that this Congress will make any progress on advancing free trade, a conservative public policy goal which all our organizations support,” the statement read. Twenty-one other groups signed the letter, including the American Conservative Union, Citizens Against Government Waste and the Competitive Enterprise Institute, among others.
The statement was silent on the issue of the Trans-Pacific Partnership. “On TPP, we’re not there yet. One thing at a time. ATR’s default position is to be supportive of free-trade agreements,” said Ryan Ellis, Americans for Tax Reform’s tax policy director.
Even within the pro-Fast Track coalition, some concerns linger. “[We] remain concerned about the potential riders and caveats,” said a source, who requested anonymity, for one of the groups that signed the letter.
Several prominent conservative groups, such as the Club for Growth, Heritage Foundation, FreedomWorks and Americans for Prosperity, were notably absent from the letter. FreedomWorks spokeswoman Iris Somberg said her group is sitting this fight out. “Sometimes we address trade but usually we stick to domestic issues,” she said.
A Club for Growth spokesman said the group was not able to provide a comment. A spokesman for Americans for Prosperity could not be reached.
A spokesman for the Heritage Foundation could not be reached for comment either, but in a January website posting on Trade Promotion Authority, senior trade policy analyst Bryan Riley noted that some “may question whether President Barack Obama would use the authority responsibly.” He argued that instead of passing Fast Track, Congress should instead assert its own authority and pass a “trade expansion mandate” that establishes “clearly defined congressional directives for U.S. trade negotiators.”
The restrictionist Federation for American Immigration Reform does not appear to have taken an official position on Fast Track or the Pacific deal, but has highlighted the same reports that alarmed NumbersUSA on its website and blog. A spokesman could not be reached for comment.
UPDATE: Dan Holler, communications director for Heritage Action for America, the Heritage Foundation’s activist arm, emailed the Washington Examiner, “We’ve been supportive in the past, but conservatives have some understandable concerns not only with the current president but with the concessions Republicans are making on the front end.”
