Hawaiʻi coalition urges Congress to oppose fast tracking the TPP
The newly-formed coalition includes groups from the labor rights, environmental protection, Native Hawaiian sovereignty, food justice, and social justice movements.
In response to U.S.-House approval to “fast track” the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade deal, a diverse coalition of Hawaiʻi organizations has issued a strong statement calling on lawmakers to undertake continuing and emboldened action to stop the enabling legislation.
Fast-tracking the legislation removes Congressional oversight of far-reaching international treaties, forcing an expedited “yes/no” vote with no amendments and limited debate. On Thursday, June 18, the U.S. House of Representatives voted to grant President Obama, and subsequent administrations, fast track authority over the TPP and similar treaties. The measure now returns to the Senate, which earlier voted for a different fast track package.
Thus far, Hawaiʻi’s Congressional delegation—Senator Brian Schatz, Senator Mazie Hirono, Representative Tulsi Gabbard and Representative Mark Takai—have all voted against fast tracking the legislation despite ongoing high-pressure efforts by the Obama Administration and Republican leadership to pass it in various forms.
The Hawaiʻi coalition, in its statement, urged congress members to maintain resolute opposition to fast tracking and to the TPP itself, listing specific concerns regarding potential local impacts.
Organizations taking part in the coalition include those from the labor, environmental, food justice, Native Hawaiian sovereignty, public health, social and economic justice, and anti human-trafficking groups, including the AiKea Movement, Babes Against Biotech, the Hawaiʻi Alliance for Progressive Action (HAPA), Hawaiʻi Peace and Justice, Hawaiʻi Farmers Union, Hawaiʻi SEED, Young Democrats Kauaʻi, Hui Hoʻopakele ʻAina, Hui o Kuapa and Hawaiian Learning Center, IWIKUA, Kauaʻi Alliance for Peace and Social Justice, Malama Kauaʻi, ʻOhana O Kauaʻi, Pacific Alliance to Stop Slavery, UNITE HERE! Local 5 and the Sierra Club of Hawaiʻi.
The statement sent to lawmakers reads:
The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and other international agreements currently being negotiated, including the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) and Trade in Services Agreement (TISA), would severely undermine democracy, equality, sustainability, worker protections, human health, and indigenous rights. The trio of international treaties that are laying the foundations for a new system of international law are centered around extending the profits, powers, privatization rights, markets and speculative capacities of the world’s largest corporations and banks. The implications for people and the planet are grave and extensive. They range from loss of access to life-saving medicines, to displacement of local food systems that feed the world’s poorest, to the ruin of Internet freedom, to the continual offshoring of jobs that drives down wages and working conditions. The TPP touches every part of our lives, and could thwart future attempts to deal with climate change and other environmental problems that threaten the livability of the planet. Further, virtually any local or national law could be challenged by corporations in offshore tribunals, dismantling the very structures of democracy.
Locally in Hawaiʻi, the TPP and similar international treaties could lead to increased foreign-ownership of the islands’ most valuable resources, terminate local procurement policies that support local agriculture, restrict renewable energy initiatives, interfere with Kanaka Maoli self-determination efforts, increase the costs of state health services like QUEST, remove both the state and counties’ abilities to regulate pesticide use, freeze minimum wage increases, inhibit the development of a more diversified economy, privatize important public services, and make all taxpayers liable for any multinational corporation’s “expected profits.”
We strongly support international agreements and actions that advance environmental and climate protections, human rights, social justice, labor protections, democracy and global cooperation. For this very reason, we oppose the TPP, and especially “fast track” legislation that would circumvent democratic deliberation over such treaties. Further, we demand transparency in the negotiation of these far-reaching international agreements, which has been extraordinarily secretive, with exception to corporate advisers that most stand to benefit. Given the impacts on all of our lives, immediate release of the working texts of the TPP, TTIP and TISA is imperative. We support all individual efforts, including by Congress members, to publish portions of draft negotiating texts.
We thank our Hawaiʻi policy-makers for voting against fast track legislation thus far, and call for continuing, and bold, action against the TPP and any fast track bill.
The most recent, House-passed version of fast track legislation could be voted on by the Senate as early as Tuesday, June 23. The House bill raises additional concerns from the original Senate version, including the prohibition of climate solutions in future trade negotiations, weakening of human trafficking measures, and elimination of currency-manipulation restrictions.
