I rise for a minute to talk about trade between the United States and our trading partners around the world. To make the point of my remarks, I ask rhetorically for everybody in the auditorium and the Senate Chamber to answer these questions: Are you willing to cut American sales of goods and services by over $2 trillion? I think the answer would be a resounding no. Secondly, are you ready to diminish or lose 39.8 million jobs? Nobody in here wants to give up $2.3 trillion in American business, and everybody wants more jobs in the middle class, and nobody wants to cost America 39 million jobs. But that is exactly what is going to happen if we don't pass TPA, if we don't enter into trade agreements and aggressively work to make the three pending trade agreements the United States has workable for our country. Yesterday I listened as Members of this body came to the floor to talk against trade and talk against the trade promotion authority. For the benefit of our new Members, trade promotion authority is our authorization to give the President the parameters, the limitations, and the prerogative to negotiate trade agreements, which come back to us for a final ratification up or down. That is a good way to do business. The world recognizes that if our President has trade promotion authority, he can sit down across the table from them and he can make a deal, and it is only subject to one vote of the U.S. Senate.…
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I ask for the yeas and nays. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second? There appears to be a sufficient second. The clerk will call the roll. The senior assistant bill clerk called the roll.
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