Political Quotes

“one other thing I wanted to comment about today, because it is coming up on the House floor, is so-called fast track, and I just want to tell my colleagues why I do not think this President, this administration, should be entrusted with fast track. Fast track is power. It is a power that we give American presidents, we as Congress, who are vested under the Constitution, or chartered under the Constitution with the obligation of making trade agreements. We give up some of that trade agreement power, power to negotiate the agreement, to the executive branch; to the President. And so the President, instead of all the Congressmen making the deals and the committees being involved in all the details, the executive branch goes out and makes the deals, like NAFTA, and then they bring them back to the House of Representatives and to the Senate and we vote on them. Now, I would say, first, a couple of things. First, I think that the negotiating team that the President has, that he has utilized for trade deals, has not been a very competent team.”