Sherrod Brown: “it is only Tuesday, and already we have a laundry list this week of reasons why we need a new direction for trade policy…”

“it is only Tuesday, and already we have a laundry list this week of reasons why we need a new direction for trade policy in our country. First, we learned that Halliburton, the beneficiary of more than $20 billion in no-bid Government contracts, is going to, in a sense, take the money and run by moving its headquarters out of the United States and to Dubai in the United Arab Emirates. Then we learned the United States is again discussing trade deals with the United Arab Emirates. These trade talks first fell apart last year during the Dubai Ports World scandal. Because of our fundamentally flawed trade policy, our Government nearly sold our port security to state-owned companies in the Middle East, and because of our fundamentally flawed trade policy, our Government continued to award no-bid contracts to Halliburton despite the fact that its subsidiaries have come under fire for doing business with the Government of Iran and for potential contract fraud in Iraq. It is time for a trade policy that rewards good corporate citizens, not one that allows our Nation's security assets to be sold to the highest bidder.”