U.S. left and right both denounce Trans-Pacific Partnership

Sanders and Trump describe the new deal as ‘disastrous,’ ‘terrible’

WASHINGTON— Donald Trump, arch-capitalist, and Bernie Sanders, America’s favourite socialist, agree on very little, but they agree on the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).

“Disastrous,” Sanders, a Democratic presidential candidate, said in a statement on Monday morning.

“The incompetence of our current administration is beyond comprehension. TPP is a terrible deal,” Trump, the leading Republican presidential candidate, wrote on Twitter on Monday afternoon.

U.S. President Barack Obama views the TPP as a central component of his future legacy, both on the economy and on foreign policy. He has framed the 12-country deal as an imperative American challenge to the rising influence of China.

Before it can be anything, though, he has to win a vote in Congress as a lame duck, during a populism-infused election season in which contenders from both parties will spend months excoriating him. And with much of the Democratic caucus skeptical of free trade, he will have to rely on congressional Republicans who have spent seven years trying to deny him big achievements.

“I think this will be viewed as the most important foreign policy achievement of the president’s second term,” said Steve Glickman, a former Obama economic adviser. Obama may not get as much cover as he would like from Hillary Clinton. Clinton, mindful of opposition from unions and environmentalists, has refused to take a position on TPP as a candidate, even though she spoke favourably of it over and over — 45 times, by CNN’s count — as Obama’s secretary of state.

Still, most observers expect TPP to pass. The House of Representatives voted 218-210 in June to give Obama the “trade promotion authority” (TPA) he needed to complete the TPP negotiations. They did so despite fierce outside pressure.

“If you were willing to vote for TPA, you’ve already exposed yourself to that political vulnerability. Unless there’s something that’s viewed as being very off about the deal, which I’d be very surprised, there’s no reason on the political front to vote against it,” said Glickman, now an adjunct assistant professor of economic diplomacy at Georgetown University. Sanders and Trump oppose the deal on broad grounds. Sanders alleges that it is a job-killing giveaway to big corporations. Trump, who boasts of his tenacity as a negotiator, argues that shrewder countries involved in the deal, such as Japan, are taking advantage of a feeble Obama.

Particular lawmakers have consid- erably narrower gripes. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, for example, is unhappy that the tobacco companies important to his state of Kentucky would be denied the right to sue governments for violating their rights under the agreement. He said Monday that he has “serious concerns.”

Laura Dawson, a trade expert who is director of the Canada Institute at Washington’s Woodrow Wilson Center, said she expects many lawmakers to register disapproval of aspects of the deal but then vote in favour.

Though the full text is not yet public, the details released so far include “a lot of cookies,” Dawson said, for various key constituencies.