Minnesota Democrats spar with Obama over trade deal

There's very little congressional Republicans and the White House agree on these days, except for the need to pass the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade deal between 12 countries that border the Pacific Ocean, including Australia, New Zealand and Vietnam.

As soon as next month, Congress may vote on whether to grant the Obama Administration the power to negotiate a final deal that Congress would then have to accept or reject.

But the biggest obstacle to passing what could be one of the last major bipartisan bills of the Obama era is from the president's own party, including nearly all of the Minnesota Democrats in Congress.

That's despite a public attempt by the White House to woo members of the delegation last month in a Minnesota-focused conference call that included Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker and members of the Dayton Administration.

"Exports not only make a difference in the number of jobs but in the quality of jobs we have in our state," state Economic Development Commissioner Katie Clark Sieben said. She cited statistics showing more than 100,000 high-paying Minnesota jobs rely on exports, which reached $21.4 billion in 2014.

Almost all of Minnesota's seven Democrats in Congress are on the record as opposing the Trans-Pacific Partnership, or having serious concerns about it. The state's three Republicans in Congress back the trade deal.

Critics of the Trans-Pacific Partnership contend that the trade deal will mean a race to the bottom in environmental and labor standards with countries such as Vietnam and Brunei that have much weaker regulations than the United States.

"You should not get a cheaper refrigerator based on somebody else not having human rights," said U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison of Minneapolis, one of the most outspoken Democratic opponents of the deal in Congress.

Ellison argues that past trade deals have led U.S. companies to outsource manufacturing jobs, contributing to the nation's growing income inequality. He also is concerned about new intellectual property provisions in the agreement that would benefit the entertainment and pharmaceutical industries.

Worse still, Ellison and others in Congress say, is the secrecy the Obama administration has imposed on the negotiations, even on members of Congress looking at the agreement's text.

"I cannot have any staff in the room," said Ellison of the times he has viewed portions of the trade deal.

On those occasions, he said, the administration has "five people in the room to tell me what this thing says and any notes I take, they take with them when I leave."

U.S. Sen. Al Franken raised similar concerns about the secrecy of the trade talks in a letter last month with five other Democratic senators to U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman, who is leading the negotiations.

"It is critical that experts across Congress, the government, and civil society have the opportunity to analyze these complex potential United States commitments," the senators wrote.

Even Democrats who haven't ruled out voting for the Trans-Pacific Partnership sounded a sour note about the trade deal, citing experience with past trade agreements.

"I don't trust [the Administration] so I'm going to have to be pretty sure about where this is going to end up before I vote for it," said U.S. Rep. Collin Peterson, who helped organize the opposition to the North American Free Trade Agreement in the 1990s.

U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar is the only Democrat in the delegation who has stayed quiet about the trade pact. Klobuchar's office did not respond to interview requests for this story, but on Thursday evening issued a statement saying she considers trade agreements on a "case by case basis" and will examine the bill closely once it's finalized.

The Trans-Pacific Partnership is a delicate issue for Klobuchar, a member of the president's Export Council. The group includes the heads of large American companies that would likely benefit from the deal.

"Senator Klobuchar has kept her cards a little closer to her chest, but at the end of the day I hope she'll do the right thing," said Josh Wise, the outgoing director of the labor-backed Minnesota Fair Trade Association.

The trade deal's Republican supporters say it is a sign that they are not opposed to every initiative of the president.

"This is the way it's supposed to work, and we should be looking at ways for cooperation," said Republican U.S. Rep. Erik Paulsen, who sits on trade subcommittee of the House Ways and Means Committee. "I think trade is a great example of an area where we can work together."

But Paulsen accused the Obama Administration of mishandling the sales job of selling the trade pact to the public and Democrats.

"I do not believe they have been engaged enough; I think they're just starting to pick that up now," Paulsen said. "I do not think they realized it could be as heavy a lift as it could be with some of their Democratic colleagues."

The debate occurs as Democrats struggle to assert themselves as the minority party in Congress. Facing a potentially tough campaign in 2016 to hold onto the White House, they also see the debate as a way to remind voters of the party's core principles.

"If we have a brand, it is that we look out for the little guy," Ellison said. "If we let this bill go through, we will be siding with major multinational corporations against all those people."

Pritzker concedes that the vote on fast-tracking the agreement won't be easy for lawmakers. But she is optimistic about the outcome.

"This is not going to pass by wide margins," Pritzker said. "This will pass by small margins, but it will pass because it's the right thing to do."