Kevin Brady: “The world has changed. It's not enough to simply buy American anymore, we have to sell American. We have to sell our…”

“The world has changed. It's not enough to simply buy American anymore, we have to sell American. We have to sell our American agriculture products, our technology products and services all throughout the world. But oftentimes, when we compete, we find much of the world is tilted against us. Other countries cut agreements to make it tough for us to sell. That's why we are involved in the World Trade Organization, to insist that other countries play by the rules, but that means America has to play by the rules as well. We lost this case in the WTO. So the question today isn't about cotton subsidies or even saving money; it's about the smart way to address this issue that protects American jobs. Now I am very sympathetic to this amendment. Paying Brazil nearly $12 million a month is not the right way to resolve this issue, and I agree with that. In fact, America should simply live up to its WTO obligation and insist that others do the same as well. The settlement that's in place today is necessary to prevent Brazil from imposing almost $1 billion of new tariffs, new taxes on American products when we try to sell them into Brazil. And it's not just agriculture products. As you heard Chairman Frank Lucas talk, he made the point that not only can Brazil penalize our ag products, they can tax and tariff a broad range of products, especially America's innovation economy.…”