Political Quotes

“Mr. President, during this trade debate, we have often heard a lot about the words ``enforcement'' or ``enforceable,'' particularly the phrase ``enforceable labor and environmental standards.'' But the fact is there are no enforceable labor and environmental standards. There is no new generation of treaty in the TPP that is going to create something we have not had before. What we have had before has simply failed us. Why is that? Well, we had side agreements on labor and the environment in NAFTA. Much is made of the fact that, well, we are not going to have side agreements anymore; we are actually going to put these standards right in the treaty itself. So somehow folks are arguing in support of this treaty that moving the print from over here to here somehow makes is it more effective. That is not the case. We had the same labor and environmental standards in the agreements we passed a few years ago, agreements I voted against--the agreement with Colombia, the agreement with Korea. But what have we seen over time? Have we ever seen any of these labor objectives and these environmental standards enforced? Let me give you a sense of what we are talking about. Under the International Labor Organization, ILO, they have a set of standards. They have lots of details.…”