Disagreements over trade between President Barack Obama and parts of his own party escalated this week, as Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe landed in Washington to promote ongoing negotiations on the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Out of the 11 nations with whom the U.S. Trade Authority has been negotiating the partnership, Japan’s is the largest economy, but its markets have remained notoriously closed to imports. U.S. supporters of the partnership hope that the deal will help open Japan’s markets to American-made cars, agricultural products and other items, as well as balance out the growing Chinese influence in the region. Abe and Obama met Tuesday, urging lawmakers to grant the president trade promotion authority or “fast-track authority” and allow Congress to limit itself to an up-or-down vote on the trade deal. “It’s never fun passing a trade bill in this town,” Obama said during a press conference at the White House Tuesday. But “here’s what I’m confident about: This will end up being the most progressive trade bill in history.”



“It will have the kinds of labor and environmental and human rights protections that have been absent in previous agreements,” he said. “It’s going to be enforceable. It’s going to open up markets that currently are not fully open to U.S. businesses. It’s going to be good for the U.S. economy.”

Two miles down Pennsylvania Avenue, where Abe is set to address a joint session on Wednesday, members of Obama’s own political party offered opposition to the trade deal and the fast-track.

Many Democrats are suspicious of free-trade agreements in general and blame the North American Free Trade Agreement, signed by President Bill Clinton in 1994, for the outsourcing of millions of jobs. Some criticize the Trans-Pacific Partnership for inadequately addressing and, in some cases, ignoring their key priorities; others point out that details of the deal have not been made public, sparking concerns about potential loopholes.

But last week Republicans pushed through fast-track legislation in committees in both the House and Senate, providing a rare moment of harmony between the GOP and the president. In turn, Democrats and their allies off the Hill ramped up the volume of their opposition.

On Monday, the Citizens Trade Campaign sent a letter signed by more than 2,000 groups opposed to fast-track to members of Congress, urging opposition to the deal

“Fast-track is an abrogation of not only Congress’ constitutional authority, but of its responsibility to the American people,” the letter reads.

And in remarks at AFL-CIO headquarters in Washington Tuesday, organization president Richard Trumka said the partnership would help corporations while harming workers, and warned potential presidential candidates that the issue would be a red line for their support.

“The TPP is the latest example of a long-term approach to trade that, starting with NAFTA, was designed to drive wages down, create special rights for corporations and export jobs,” he said. “The labor movement opposes Fast Track. We expect those who seek to lead our nation forward to oppose fast-track. There is no middle ground, and the time for deliberations is drawing to a close."

Obama has attempted to soothe those his Democratic colleagues.

“Don't fight the last war,” he said on MSNBC last week. “Wait and see what we actually have in this deal before you make those judgments.”

But liberals in the party, including progressive champion Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., are unhappy with what they have heard -- and worried about what they still haven’t.

“They say the deal is nearly done, and they are making a lot of promises about how the deal will affect workers, the environment, and human rights,” Warren wrote on her website. “Promises – but people like you can’t see the actual deal.”

Others say no matter how good the current deal is, it is unacceptable without enforceable rules that would prevent trade partners from deliberately devaluing their currencies in order to make their exports cheaper, a tactic called currency manipulation.

“Currency manipulation is cheating,” said Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., a leading opponent of the partnership, noting that the Peterson Institute for International Economics has calculated that between 1 million and 5 million American jobs have been lost because of currency manipulation alone.

She said Japan is considered to be the worst currency manipulator in the world, after China. While the Trans-Pacific Partnership nations include about 40 percent of the world’s economy, China is so far not involved.

“Why isn’t this a deal-breaker for us?” DeLauro asked. “We should be willing to walk away on this issue alone.”



“As someone who has focused on making it worthy, it’s not worthy,” said House Ways and Means Committee ranking member Sander Levin, D-Mich., who has met several times with the administration in an effort to add acceptable language on currency manipulation.

The intra-party squabbling has made the topic to a 2016 election issue.

Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton has changed positions on trade agreements on several notable occasions throughout her career. When she was first lady, Clinton championed the NAFTA agreement brokered by her husband, but her support was noticeably cooler when she ran for Senate in 2000, when she called the deal “flawed.”

As a senator, she supported bilateral agreements with Singapore, Chile, Peru and Australia -- all Trans-Pacific Partnership nations -- as well as Morocco, Oman and Jordan, but opposed the Central American Free Trade Agreement. Then, while running for president in 2008, she opposed Colombia, Panama and South Korea agreements, but reversed course on Colombia and South Korea -- and became a strong advocate for the Trans-Pacific Partnership -- while serving as secretary of state under Obama.

Since declaring her candidacy for 2016, however, Clinton has refused to pick a position on the issue.

"Any trade deal has to produce jobs and raise wages and increase prosperity and protect our security," she said in New Hampshire earlier this month.

In a statement in mid-April, her spokesman Nick Merrill elaborated: “We should be willing to walk away from any outcome that falls short of these tests. The goal is greater prosperity and security for American families, not trade for trade's sake. She will be watching closely.”

Her opponents on the right and the left have taken her to task for her lack of a strong stance.

"We need to stop entering into bad trade deals," Former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley said in a video released earlier this month. "I'm for trade, and I'm for good trade deals, but I'm against bad trade deals like the Trans-Pacific Partnership. We need to focus on making our economy more sustainable, more circular, and making ourselves strong here at home."



Republican Jeb Bush, who supports the partnership, knocked Clinton in a sharply worded essay posted to Medium.

“These new reservations are conveniently timed,” he wrote. “Secretary Clinton wavered on support for trade the last time she ran for President as well. It seems Secretary Clinton thinks we have a short memory.”

Meanwhile, Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., has called for Clinton to get off the fence even as he prepares to launch his own run for the Democratic nomination.

“She’s going to have to be clear,” he said. “Are you on the side of working people who would suffer as a result of this disastrous trade agreement, and seeing their jobs go to China or Mexico, or are you on the side of corporate America? It’s not a very difficult choice.”

The deal could have serious implications for whoever wins the 2016 election. Negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership began in 2005; the deal was supposed to be finalized in 2012. Disagreements could continue to stall the deal, leaving the decision in the hands of not President Obama, but whoever is sworn in as his successor.



