Download Production Quality Footage of Sen. Brown’s Exchange HERE


WASHINGTON,D.C. – In Case You Missed It: yesterday, during a Senate Finance Committeehearing titled “The Promise and Challenge of Strategic Trade Engagement inthe Indo-Pacific Region,” U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH) asked MichaelWessel, Principal, The Wessel Group Inc.; Staff Chair, Labor Advisory Committeeto USTR and Department of Labor, about needed investments in domesticproduction and ways to build labor enforcement into all of our trade policies,including the Administration’s proposed Indo-PacificEconomic Framework (IPEF).
 
“We want a worker-centered trade approach that creates good jobs,that raises wages, that rebuilds our industrial base, that protects workers’health and safety, and our planet, and that improves labor rights worldwide,” said Brown inthe Finance hearing. “We’re also united in wanting to counter China’s laborand human rights abuses and its cheating in the global economy. We need to putthe world on notice. Trade with the United States will be possible, but underdifferent rules than in the past. The rules in any agreement matter – theymatter for union steelworkers in Eastern Ohio and they matter for new solarenergy companies in Northwestern Ohio.”
 
Brownasked Mr. Wessel what he believes the administration should implement before,during, and after trade agreements like this.
 
“We first have to rebuild oureconomy to make sure we’re approaching all of this from a position of strength.Second, we really need to have a better idea of what the Administration wantsto achieve with IPEF. It is still ill-defined and congress along with otherstakeholders have to be at the table and need to be real partners in all ofthis.  And then, whatever provisions we’re able to achieve – hopefullywith your help, Senator Wyden’s help and the rest of the committee – they haveto be properly implemented, monitored and enforced. Too often we sign agreementsand then move on to the next one without ensuring that we achieve the resultsthat have been expected,” said Mr. Wessel.
 
Brown then asked Mr. Wessel what guidancehe would recommend to ensure that labor provisions included in an Indo-PacificEconomic Framework are enforceable.
 
“Thank you not only for yourquestion but for the leadership you and Chairman Wyden had on putting togetherthe Rapid Response Mechanism that is having a fundamental impact on laborrights in Mexico. You mentioned the two cases where the workers at the Mazdafacility rejected a protection contract that their protection union was tryingto force on them – so it is a model going forward. But that model was alsobuilt on all the work you and so many others were engaged in to make sure thestandards that are being enforced are worthy of our efforts. That’s a criticalissue for the Indo-Pacific. We saw inadequate labor consistency plans in thelabor TPP – Vietnam was a perfect example. So, we must not only have the rightstandards and push forward, but we need efforts to promote the right kind ofenforcement mechanisms and engage in new implementation, monitoring,enforcement efforts to support workers around the globe,” said Mr. Wessel.
 
Brown has long advocated for labor-centered trade enforcement andMade in America policy.
 
In February, Brown applauded the news thatworkers in the Silao, Mexico General Motors plant have voted to be representedby the independent labor union Sindicato Independiente Nacional de TrabajadoresTrabajadoras de la Industria Automotriz (SINTTIA). When corporations are heldaccountable for treating workers fairly, regardless of where those workers arelocated, companies no longer have an incentive to move jobs abroad – therebyprotecting workers on both sides of the border.
 
The Brown-Wyden Rapid Response Mechanism (RRM) represents thefirst-ever overhaul of labor enforcement standards in a trade agreement sincethe U.S. started negotiating trade deals. The new agreement allows workers inMexico to report when a company is violating their rights and seek immediateaction if it’s determined that workers’ rights have been violated. TheBrown-Wyden RRM allows for punitive damages when corporations violate laborprotections, and authorizes the U.S. to prevent goods from coming into Americaif companies continue their anti-worker tactics.
 
In November, Brown announced that hisbipartisan bill, the Build America, Buy America Act, wassigned into law by President Biden. Brown had been pushing for this legislationsince 2017 and reintroduced it earlier in2021. Brown fought and successfully included this legislation in the bipartisaninfrastructure bill that passed the Senate lastAugust and in the version that passed the House of Representatives lastNovember.
 
Brown, a Senate Auto Caucus co-chair, applauded the Houseof Representatives for passing the America Creating Opportunitiesfor Manufacturing, Pre-Eminence in Technology and Economic Strength (COMPETES)Act of 2022, the House version of the U.S. Innovationand Competition Act (USICA), andurges a quick negotiation of a final bill to send to the president’s desk to besigned into law.
 
In January, Brown wrote toCongressional leadership, urging swift passage of revised bipartisanlegislation to invest in manufacturing and improve the effectiveness of theU.S. trade remedy system. The senator’s priorities laid out in the letter wereincluded in the introduction of the America COMPETES Act. 
 
Downloadproduction quality footage of Brown’s exchange HERE.
 

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