House Democrats launch review of trade policy

[Ron Burgundy]

Reuters - Congressional Democrats said on Tuesday they needed to do a thorough review of U.S. trade policy before considering the Bush administration's request for renewed "fast-track" authority to negotiate trade agreements.

House of Representative Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles Rangel (news, bio, voting record), a New York Democrat, outlined a cautious approach to renewing the White House's ability to strike trade agreements that lawmakers are required approve or reject without making changes.

That legislation, which the Bush administration needs to conclude the 5-year-old Doha round of world trade talks and other possible trade pacts, expires on July 1.

The White House urged Congress on Monday to renew the trade promotion authority. President George W. Bush is expected to talk about the importance of trade to the U.S. economy in speeches on Tuesday and Wednesday in Illinois and New York.

At the start of a hearing on trade and globalization, Rangel said he hoped to work with Republicans, business groups, labor unions and other interested parties "to come up with something to make globalization less painful."

But Rangel also warned that the 2008 presidential campaign could soon make it politically difficult to come to a bipartisan consensus on trade.

Rep. Sander Levin (news, bio, voting record), Michigan Democrat who chairs the Ways and Means subcommittee on trade, said it would be premature for Congress to act on the Bush administration's request to extend trade promotion authority before it has thoroughly reviewed the costs and benefits of current trade policy.

Levin said he believed there was much more the government could do to reduce the negative effects of trade than the United States has done under the Bush administration.

Gene Sperling, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress who previously worked for former President Bill Clinton, said Congress should consider "a limited TPA just for the Doha round" if the Bush administration agrees to strengthen labor and environmental provisions in free trade agreements.

source: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070130/pl_nm/usa_trade_congress_dc [link]