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Exclusive — Jeff Sessions: ’Matter Of Supreme Importance’ GOP Nominee Can ‘Negotiate Better’ Trade Deals Than Obamatrade
Breitbart / Big-Government
Matthew Boyle
1/25/2016
Excerpts:
While he’s not making an official endorsement for the presidency in 2016’s GOP primary, at least not yet, Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) is calling on the people of Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina to very carefully pick a candidate they think can “negotiate better” when it comes to trade deals.
Sessions made the comments in a 45-minute-long, exclusive phone interview with Breitbart News.
He laid out the case for why Republicans must nominate a candidate who opposes the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the accompanying two global trade deals that would come with it: The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (T-TIP) and the Trade in Services Agreement (TiSA). All three deals, along with the fast-track Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) that greases the skids for the eventual easy passage through Congress of each of the deals since TPA lowers the Senate’s 60-vote threshold to just 51 votes and kills the ability for amendments, have become collectively known as “Obamatrade.”
Since the passage of TPA—during which time the text of TPP was kept in a hidden basement classified reading room in the U.S. Capitol where only members of Congress could go to see it in person, without taking notes or copies of the text with them—in 2015, TPP has been on hold.
T-TIP and TiSA text, save for a leak of draft TiSA materials to WikiLeaks, have been unavailable even to members of Congress never mind the public. President Barack Obama’s administration has since released the full text of TPP—which is 5,544 pages long—but the administration is holding the deal back for now, presumably waiting to formally introduce ratification legislation to Congress until a timeframe that would allow them to time it so that a vote in Congress would come up during a lame duck session after the November 2016 elections.
“There’s no doubt that the pro-TPP people understood that there was a strong and growing opposition to this agreement,” Sessions told Breitbart News.
Sessions said he expects Obama to engage in manipulation of the congressional calendar to introduce the text so he can purposely have the vote in the lame duck session—when members of Congress can’t be held accountable by their constituents.
“We’re now told it’s going to be filed, or signed, by the president on Feb. 4,” Sessions said.
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It’s worth noting that 2016 GOP frontrunner billionaire Donald Trump has made this type of trade policy Sessions is talking about a centerpiece of his presidential campaign. While Sessions isn’t endorsing anyone at this time officially, he has appeared with Trump at a Trump campaign rally in Alabama earlier this election and also held a meeting with him at the U.S. Capitol during the campaign. Sessions also helped Trump with his immigration reform plan.
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View the complete article, including image, at:
http://www.breitbart.com/big-governm...an-obamatrade/
Breitbart / Big-Government
Matthew Boyle
1/25/2016
Excerpts:
While he’s not making an official endorsement for the presidency in 2016’s GOP primary, at least not yet, Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) is calling on the people of Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina to very carefully pick a candidate they think can “negotiate better” when it comes to trade deals.
Sessions made the comments in a 45-minute-long, exclusive phone interview with Breitbart News.
He laid out the case for why Republicans must nominate a candidate who opposes the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the accompanying two global trade deals that would come with it: The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (T-TIP) and the Trade in Services Agreement (TiSA). All three deals, along with the fast-track Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) that greases the skids for the eventual easy passage through Congress of each of the deals since TPA lowers the Senate’s 60-vote threshold to just 51 votes and kills the ability for amendments, have become collectively known as “Obamatrade.”
Since the passage of TPA—during which time the text of TPP was kept in a hidden basement classified reading room in the U.S. Capitol where only members of Congress could go to see it in person, without taking notes or copies of the text with them—in 2015, TPP has been on hold.
T-TIP and TiSA text, save for a leak of draft TiSA materials to WikiLeaks, have been unavailable even to members of Congress never mind the public. President Barack Obama’s administration has since released the full text of TPP—which is 5,544 pages long—but the administration is holding the deal back for now, presumably waiting to formally introduce ratification legislation to Congress until a timeframe that would allow them to time it so that a vote in Congress would come up during a lame duck session after the November 2016 elections.
“There’s no doubt that the pro-TPP people understood that there was a strong and growing opposition to this agreement,” Sessions told Breitbart News.
It is an historic agreement. It is an incredibly colossal trade agreement. I’ve got it on my desk here, it’s about four feet tall—5,000 plus pages. It covers a host of issues, beyond what anyone would imagine and it creates an international commission that has extraordinary powers in which the United States—like all the other nations—has only one vote. So this is huge. There’s been a deliberate decision, in my opinion, to quit talking about it, to try to get it off the agenda probably I think even the supporters don’t want to bring it up before the election because voters will then be able to evaluate their elected representatives on how they vote. So, most likely, they’ll do their best to not talk about it. The establishment media will assist in not talking about it during the campaign, not asking about it during debates to keep this off the table, and then there will be an attempt to bring this up during the lame duck—or if a president wins that’s for it, it could be carried over to next year. So, in a fundamental sense, the presidential election will have extraordinary influence on this. If a Republican candidate wins that opposes it, it’s unlikely it would get through Congress. Hillary Clinton has been for it and against it, so if she gets elected they might yet try to get it through. So their best hope is to elect a pro-trade, pro-TPP president and try to move it through in the lame duck session in my opinion. That’s my best political judgment. So there is an awareness that the people do not support it, and there is an attempt to keep the discussion out of the election debate.
Sessions said he expects Obama to engage in manipulation of the congressional calendar to introduce the text so he can purposely have the vote in the lame duck session—when members of Congress can’t be held accountable by their constituents.
“We’re now told it’s going to be filed, or signed, by the president on Feb. 4,” Sessions said.
.................................................. ........
It’s worth noting that 2016 GOP frontrunner billionaire Donald Trump has made this type of trade policy Sessions is talking about a centerpiece of his presidential campaign. While Sessions isn’t endorsing anyone at this time officially, he has appeared with Trump at a Trump campaign rally in Alabama earlier this election and also held a meeting with him at the U.S. Capitol during the campaign. Sessions also helped Trump with his immigration reform plan.
...........................................
View the complete article, including image, at:
http://www.breitbart.com/big-governm...an-obamatrade/