Resolution - : TO SUPPORT A FAIR TRADE MODEL AND OPPOSING THE COLOMBIA,PANAMA AND SOUTH KOREA FREE TRADE AGREEMENTS.

WHEREAS, LULAC supports a new U.S. trade policy that creates living-wages, sustainable jobs for people in the U.S. and trade partners countries while promoting democracy, human rights, labor standards, a healthy environment, and access to essential services; and

WHEREAS, LULAC opposes the pending U.S. Columbia Free Trade Agreement (FTA) and U.S. Panama FTAs, and it has in the past opposed the U.S. Peru FTAs and the Central America FTA (CAFTA) because these pacts did not meet these goals; and

WHEREAS, LULAC has succeeded in bringing to national attention to how agriculture provisions in the North American FTA (NAFTA) and CAFTA have forced rural Latin Americans to leave their countries and families, risking their lives crossing the U.S. border to be able to support their loved ones back home; and

WHEREAS, since NAFTA the U.S. has lost over 5 million family-supporting manufacturing jobs and whereas the country cannot sustain further job loss of this magnitude, especially when unemployment disproportionately affects Latino families and other people of color; and

WHEREAS, the foreign investor provisions and their private enforcement included in pacts like NAFTA and CAFTA threaten the sovereignty and the environment of Latin American nations, and their control of their natural resources; and

WHEREAS, President Obama committed during his campaign to create a new American trade model that could deliver benefits to more people and remedy these problems; and

WHEREAS, a comprehensive, bipartisan reform bill- the Trade Reform, Accountability, Development and Employment (TRADE) Act- that would deliver on Obama’s commitment by addressing agricultural displacement, job loss and other past trade deal problems has been introduced and is supported by over 150 members of Congress; and

WHEREAS, the Obama administration has announced that it seeks to address outstanding issues with three leftover NAFTA-style FTA’s with Colombia, Panama and South Korea signed by President Bush and send them to Congress for approval; and

WHEREAS, the Obama administration has not specified if it intends to renegotiate the Bush era agreements in accordance with President Obama’s campaign commitments on trade reform;

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, that the League of United Latin American Citizens will continue to fully and actively support a new fair trade model based on the TRADE Act, and calls on Members of Congress to co-sponsor this landmark legislation in both the House (HR 3012) and Senate (S. 2821)

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, opposes ratification of FTAs with Colombia, Panama and South Korea leftover from the Bush administration unless and until they are renegotiated in line with the pro-trade, pro-democracy, pro-development, pro-employment principles of the TRADE Act;

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that a copy of this resolution be provided to the President of the United State, the Members of the appropriate Congressional committees, the U.S. Trade Representative, the Secretary of Commerce, The Secretary of Labor, the Secretary of Agriculture and the Administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Approved this 17th day of July 2010.

Margaret Moran
LULAC National President