Political Quotes

“Mr. President, I support all three pending free trade agreements, FTAs. They will be good for our country and good for Virginia. They will create jobs by opening markets for high quality American products. Trade with Korea was worth $379 million to Virginia in 2010. Colombia was worth $80 million and Panama was worth $30 million. The Commonwealth stands to benefit from expanded opportunities for agriculture, chemicals, information technology, services, and other key sectors. The success of FTAs for Virginia can be seen in the 13 other agreements entered into over the past decade. The 2004 U.S.-Singapore FTA enabled Singapore to become the fastest-growing market among the major buyers of Virginia's goods, rising from $300 million to over $1 billion last year, mainly in computers and electronics. All told, Virginia did $17.1 billion in exports last year, including $14 billion in manufactured goods, $1.2 billion in agriculture, and a host of other products. Nonetheless, it is very important to me that we do more as a country to make sure the benefits of trade agreements and international commerce are more evenly distributed across this country. In the past, some States have done really well under trade deals. Others have not. Most of Virginia has been lucky to be on the winning end of trade. But there are areas, like southside Virginia, that have not seen the same benefits from earlier trade deals.…”