George Miller: “Mr. Chairman, I differ with my colleagues on the other side. I think, in fact, we are here because of the international…”

“Mr. Chairman, I differ with my colleagues on the other side. I think, in fact, we are here because of the international trade agreements. I believe we are here because there are those who insist that somehow that American environmental labor standards will be destroyed on the altar of what is called free trade. This is a bad bill. It is bad environmental policy, it is bad trade policy, and it is bad foreign policy. It does precisely what we were told NAFTA and GATT would not do: It demands that U.S. sovereignty play second stage to the demands of our trading partners. I appreciate why the gentleman is involved, and he is involved in good faith in this legislation, but we are here today because of those international agreements, because of those demands of our trading partners that somehow we change the label because they view this as a trade barrier to free trade. Rather than them change the manner in which they fish, rather than their engaging in fishing as our fleet does, as a good portion of the Mexican fleet does, they have chosen to go ahead and to decide to fish in a manner which is dolphin unsafe.”