On the recordOctober 11, 2011
Today with unemployment in the United States at over 9 percent and the middle class under siege, we're considering a Colombian trade bill that would cost, according to the Economic Policy Institute, 55,000 jobs. That makes absolutely no sense. It's bad enough to ship U.S. jobs overseas, but particularly to a country that leads the world in deadly violence against union members. In Colombia, to band together in solidarity with your fellow workers is to take your life into your own hands. Twenty-three trade unionists have been murdered so far this year, including one teacher--a teacher-- who was hanged with barbed wire. Last year, 51 such murders. As the AFL-CIO put it, ``if 51 CEOs had been murdered in Colombia, this deal would be on a very slow track indeed.'' Let's reject these trade agreements, and let's put America back to work with a big, bold jobs plan for the American people.
