The pro-open borders, avid free trader Sen. Jeff Flake (R-AZ) has introduced legislation to “nullify” President Trump’s tariffs on imported steel and aluminum designed to increase American manufacturing for U.S. workers.

In a speech on the Senate floor on Monday, Flake announced his legislation that would essentially bar the tariffs from being implemented. Last week, Trump made history when he signed into law a 25 percent tariff on imported steel and a 10 percent tariff on imported aluminum – a move that was welcomed by American workers who have been negatively impacted for decades by multinational free trade deals.

Flake said in his remarks that free trade and immigration are a “convenient scapegoat” for the Trump administration, and not the actual cause of outsourcing, rootless globalization, and a declined manufacturing and production base in the U.S.

Instead, Flake says “we have to have” more free trade and should have remained in the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) free trade deal, which Trump pulled the U.S. out of. TPP was expected to not only eliminate millions of U.S. working and middle-class jobs, but also drive down wages for remaining American workers.

Flake said:

I understand free trade is sometimes a challenge. I understand that it’s a challenge on the campaign trail, certainly, it’s often easier to point to a shuttered factory and blame trade or immigration or some other convenient scapegoat other than what is usually the case, it’s modernization or mechanization or something that has meant that we have increased productivity–productivity or the best allocation of capital to facilitate trade. [Emphasis added] We have to have bilateral and multilateral trade deals if we are to catch up. If we continue to withdraw from the global marketplace, we will be left far behind. We saw this with regard to the Trans-Pacific Partnership. We pulled out of those negotiations and the other 11 countries involved simply have gone on their own, leaving us behind. This has meant, in particular, countries in Southeast Asia who would like to be part of our trade orbit have no choice but to be more reliant on China. That doesn’t serve our interests at all. [Emphasis added]

Flake’s efforts to nullify Trump’s tariffs come as he has also attempted to push a massive amnesty for millions of illegal aliens that would flood the U.S. labor market and immediately drive down wages for American workers.

Jeff Flake Pushes Minor Wall Funding-for-Amnesty: DACA Illegal Aliens ‘Represent Best of America’https://t.co/JFuzvsl65D — John Binder 👽 (@JxhnBinder) February 20, 2018

Flake’s avid free trade and open borders ideology comes at the expense of American workers who have suffered from poor job growth, stagnant wages, and increased public costs to offset the importation of millions of low-skilled foreign nationals every year.

Likewise, with free trade, American workers have taken the hardest hit. For example, massive trade deficits due to free trade with Mexico have left the once-booming working and middle-class Rust Belt region crumbling, with a net total of about 700,000 U.S. jobs displaced, including:

14,500 American workers displaced in Wisconsin

43,600 American workers displaced in Michigan

2,600 American workers displaced in West Virginia

26,300 American workers displaced in Pennsylvania

34,900 American workers displaced in Ohio

34,300 American workers displaced in New York

6,500 American workers displaced in Iowa

24,400 American workers displaced in Indiana

34,700 American workers displaced in Illinois