Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Too many Americans, as my friend from Ohio said, face financial barriers to health care. The American Cancer Society and other patient advocates support H.R. 1812 because they know that many Americans also face serious nonfinancial barriers; racial, cultural, linguistic and geographical barriers; barriers that have contributed to striking disparities across racial and ethnic lines in the incidence and treatment of cancer and other serious diseases.

This is by no means a minor or inconsequential issue. It is a crisis, and addressing it should be one of our Nation's highest priorities. According to former Surgeon General David Satcher, more than 80,000 African Americans die every year because of continuing disparities in health care; 80,000.

African American and Latino adults are disproportionately more likely than whites to suffer from chronic conditions such as heart disease, cancer, asthma, depression, diabetes and high blood pressure. Modern medicine can combat these conditions, but only if it is available to those that need it. The earlier people receive preventative, diagnostic and treatment services, the better.

Prevention and timely treatment are not only optimal from a public health perspective, they are optimal from a budget perspective. Timely care is cost-efficient care. The complexity and fragmentation of our health care system is perhaps the most daunting barrier of all. It exacerbates racial and ethnic disparities and reduces the efficiency of health care across the board.

The patient navigator bill lays out a comprehensive strategy designed to foster prevention, early diagnosis and efficient treatment of serious illnesses. The goal is twofold: To reach those who are currently disenfranchised from the health care system, and to help ease the way for those who face a serious illness, an intimidating array of treatment options and uncertainty about the best course of action.

This bill establishes a year-round community outreach program to promote cost-effective preventive services, including cancer screening. Early detection saves dollars, and, more importantly, saves lives.

The program features culturally and linguistically competent patient navigators who are trained to assist and empower patients, serve as their advocates in negotiating our complicated and too often impersonal health care system, and help patients overcome barriers to health care services.

With this legislation's passage, we can expect to see increased enrollment in clinical trials, greater community involvement and health awareness, a more coordinated approach to health care delivery, and enhanced access to timely health care services for racial and ethnic minorities.

H.R. 1812 has the endorsement of the American Cancer Society, the National Association of Community Health Centers, the National Council of La Raza, the American Diabetes Association and the American Medical Association.

I want to commend the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Menendez) and the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Pryce) for their hard work on this legislation. I am pleased to support it.

Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, the administration, desperate after a series of failed attempts to gin up support for the Central America Free Trade Agreement, now has resorted to making all sorts of fantastic promises: bridges, highways and other pork projects, and outrageous threats.

The Washington Post reported yesterday that Tom Donohue, President of the United States Chamber of Commerce, warned a group of Hill leaders and business people, ``If you are going to vote against it, it is going to cost you.''

We know from past experience that if CAFTA comes to the House floor, it will come in the middle of the night, when votes are held open, threats are made on the House floor and a one-vote margin is secured to force through what most of us in Congress agree is bad policy.

Fast track won by only one vote. The same Mr. Donohue said back then, ``A one-vote margin is all that we could afford.''

Madam Speaker, this agreement has languished in Congress for more than a year. It is time for the President and Ambassador Portman to stop wasting time with toothless, meaningless side deals. It is time to renegotiate a better Central American Free Trade Agreement.

Mr. Speaker, at a White House news conference 2 weeks ago, President Bush called on Congress to pass the Central American Free Trade Agreement this summer. Last week in this Chamber, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay), the most powerful Republican in the House, promised a vote by July 4. Well, he actually promised a vote last year, and then he promised a vote again in May, but this time he means it, I think, and we are going to actually vote on this by July 4.

I am joined tonight by the gentleman from Niles, Trumbull County, Ohio (Mr. Ryan) and the gentlewoman from Toledo, Ohio (Ms. Kaptur), two of my colleagues from my State; and there will be the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky) and others coming along later.

Mr. Speaker, many of us who have been speaking out against the Central American Free Trade Agreement have a message for the President, and that is we should renegotiate CAFTA.

President Bush signed CAFTA more than a year ago. Every trade agreement negotiated by this administration has been ratified by Congress within 2 months of its signing. Australia, Singapore, Chile, Morocco, each of those trade agreements the President signed was passed, was ratified, was voted on by Congress within a couple of months. CAFTA, however, has languished in Congress for more than a year without a vote because this wrong-headed trade agreement offends both Republicans and Democrats. It offends small manufacturers and labor. It offends environmentalists and food safety advocates. It offends religious organizations in Central America and in our country.

But most importantly, Mr. Speaker, look at what our trade policy has brought us. In 1992 the United States trade deficit, in other words, how much we import versus how much we export, our trade deficit was $38 billion, the year I first ran for Congress, in 1992. Last year this trade deficit was $618 billion. It went from $38 billion to $618 billion in literally a dozen years. It is hard to argue our trade policy is working when the deficit goes from $38 billion to $618 billion in just a dozen years.

Tomorrow, Mr. Speaker, the Senate Finance Committee is scheduled to take up CAFTA in what is called a mock markup. In tomorrow's mock markup, 10 legislators from Central America will attempt to offer statements on behalf of the hundreds of thousands of Central Americans who oppose this dysfunctional cousin of the North American Free Trade Agreement. I say these legislators will ``attempt'' because they have not been asked nor, the word we get, will they be allowed to offer any official remarks at any hearings on CAFTA.

Instead, the administration and CAFTA supporters in Congress crafted a one-sided plan to benefit multinational corporations at the expense of U.S. workers and businesses, U.S. farmers and ranchers, and Central American workers and businesses and Central America's farmers and ranchers. Opponents to CAFTA know it is simply an extension of NAFTA, which clearly, as the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur) has pointed out on this floor for a dozen years, has not worked for our country.

It is the same old story, Mr. Speaker. Every time there is a trade agreement, the President says it will mean more jobs for the U.S., it will mean increased manufacturing in the U.S., increased exports of American-produced goods to other countries, and better wages for developing countries.

But look at this chart, Mr. Speaker. The States here in red are States that in the last 5 years have lost 20 percent of their manufacturing. Michigan, 210,000 jobs, more than 20 percent of their manufacturing base; Illinois, 224,000; Ohio, 216,000; Pennsylvania, 200,000 jobs; North Carolina, 228,000; Mississippi and Alabama combined, about 130,000 jobs. In State after State after State, we have lost 20 percent of our manufacturing base. In many of the other States, we have lost thousands of jobs also.

So they continue to promise more jobs, more manufacturing, more exports, a higher standard of living in the developing world. But with every trade agreement, their promises fall by the wayside in favor of big business interests that send U.S. jobs overseas and exploit cheap labor abroad. In the face of overwhelming bipartisan opposition, the administration and Republican leadership have tried every trick in the book to pass this CAFTA.

As I said earlier, we in this body could agree on a Central American Free Trade Agreement, but not one that is tilted against American workers, not one that is tilted against workers in Central America, not one that is tilted for the drug industry and against the environment and against worker rights.

But this year, because nothing else seems to be working in convincing Congress, Republicans and Democrats alike, the administration is linking CAFTA to helping democracy in the developing world. Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, Deputy Secretary Zoellick, both have said CAFTA will help in the War on Terror. I am not sure how. They have never really explained that. But that is what they claim.

Ten years of NAFTA, Mr. Speaker, has done nothing to improve border security between Mexico and the United States; so that argument does not wash. Then in May, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, in one of their famous junkets that we hear more and more about from some of our friends in this body, flew the six presidents from Central America and the Dominican Republic around our country, hoping they might be able to sell CAFTA to newspaper editors, to our country's voters, to our country's Congress. They flew to Albuquerque. The Chamber of Commerce flew these six presidents to Albuquerque and to Los Angeles; to New York; to Miami; to Cincinnati, my home State of Ohio.

Again they failed. And after the trip, the Costa Rican President broke off from the group and announced that his country would not ratify CAFTA unless an independent commission could determine the agreement will not hurt the working poor.

In addition, Mr. Speaker, we have seen demonstration after demonstration in Central America, 45 demonstrations with more than 150,000 workers, opposing this agreement. Some of their Presidents might be for it, some of them might be, but their workers certainly are not. In this case, this was in Guatemala, when the police went up against 8,000 workers, two of these workers were killed by their country's security forces.

Now the administration is trying something different. They have opened up the bank. Desperate after failing to gin up support for the agreement based on its merits, CAFTA supporters now are attempting to buy votes with fantastic promises. If history is any example, should the promises fail, they will try and force votes their way with outrageous threats.

Instead of wasting time with toothless side deals, U.S. Trade Ambassador Portman should negotiate a CAFTA that will actually pass Congress. Republicans and Democrats, small manufacturers and labor groups, farmers, ranchers, faith-based groups in all seven countries, religious leaders, environmental human rights organizations and workers are all speaking with one voice: Renegotiate CAFTA; give us a CAFTA, but one very different from this.

This CAFTA will not enable Central American workers to buy cars made in the district of the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) or the district of the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur.) They will not enable Central American workers to buy software developed in Seattle, or prime beef in Nebraska.

A Nicaraguan worker, Mr. Speaker, earns $2,800 a year. The combined economic output of the Central American nations is equivalent to that of Columbus, Ohio, or New Haven, Connecticut, or Orlando, Florida, or Memphis, Tennessee. Workers in the United States make $38,000 a year on average.

Workers in Costa Rica make $9,000; Dominican Republic, $6,000; Nicaragua and Honduras, the average makes significantly less than $3,000 a year. They are not going to buy the cars made in the district of the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) or the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur). They are not going to buy steel made in my district. They are not going to buy apparel made in North Carolina. They are not going to buy software from Seattle, or prime beef from Kansas. They simply cannot afford to do this.

This CAFTA is not about exporting American products. It is about U.S. companies moving plants to Honduras, paying $2,600 a year; outsourcing jobs to El Salvador, where workers make less than $5,000; exporting cheap labor in Guatemala where workers make $4,000 a year.

Mr. Speaker, when the world's poorest people can buy American products and not just make them, then we will know that our trade policies are working.

Mr. Speaker, we should renegotiate; defeat this Central American Free Trade Agreement, start again and renegotiate a CAFTA that will lift up workers and environmental standards in all the involved countries.

I would like to yield to my friend from Toledo, the gentlewoman from

Ohio (Ms. Kaptur), and thank her for her terrific work for years on trade issues.

Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I thank my friend for her terrific work representing American workers.

I yield to my friend the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan).

Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan). One of the things that the gentleman pointed out is talking about school kids in Youngstown or talking about police and fire in his community, and we do a lot of talking about statistics and numbers and the trade deficit going from $13 billion to $618 billion in a dozen years, but then we think about what this means. When President Bush, Senior, said for every billion dollars in trade surplus or trade deficit, that translated into 12,000 jobs; for every billion-dollar trade surplus, it is 12,000 more jobs for our country; for every 12 billion-dollar trade deficit, it is 12,000 fewer jobs, many of those manufacturing jobs.

So when we have this kind of trade deficit of $618 billion, you multiply that times 12,000 jobs, according to President Bush, Senior, however you do the math, these are a lot of people that lose jobs, communities that experience plant closings, a lot of police and fire who protect our communities who get laid off when these plants close. These are a lot of cuts to public education. As the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) says, you then need to pass school levies and it is so hard to pass school levies when people have lost their homes and lost their jobs and are barely able to make ends meet, and have taken a job where they were making $35,000 a year and are now making $17,000 a year, and they cannot afford a property tax increase, so schools lose out and kids lose out, and it is just a downward spiral.

So when you see these numbers, you think about people in our communities, it does not matter if they are Democrats or Republicans, because these job losses, as we have pointed out, these job losses in manufacturing alone, particularly throughout the Midwest and the south, North and South Carolina, Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, and States from Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Indiana and Illinois, up into Wisconsin, think of these 200,000 per State manufacturing job losses is a whole lot of people, a whole lot of bread winners and families that come home to their kids and cannot do what they were able to do before they lost their jobs. Their schools are hurting, their public safety is hurting, they are not able to send their kids on to school, all the kinds of things that go with lost jobs. That is why this is so important.

Mr. Speaker, I would point out that the States in white, and there are two of them, actually had manufacturing job growth. In these two States, total population is about 2 million people out of a country of 280 million, so these two States represent less than one percent of our country. Not that they are not important if you live in those two States, but they are the only States that have had manufacturing job growth.

All of the States in red have lost 20 percent of their manufacturing, 20 percent, hundreds of thousands of jobs in many of these States. The States in blue have lost up to 20 percent, 15 to 20, so it is State after State after State has just been hurt badly by this. And as we have all talked, it clearly translates into people's lives.

Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) mentions freedom. Another word or phrase that is thrown around here a lot is Christian values and fair play and morality. And when we pass a trade agreement that throws American workers in these numbers out of jobs and then exploits a worker that the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur) talked about making 12 cents that makes a product that sells in the United States for $20, what kind of exploitation, what kind of family values, what kind of morality that does describe our actions?

Yet, it is pretty clear to an awful lot of people in this body, I think, and it is pretty clear to a whole lot of Americans that the values that we hold dear, no matter what your religion or your faith, if your religion or your faith is based on our country doing the right thing, it simply does not fit, to pass a trade agreement that costs people these kinds of jobs, that exploits the most defenseless people in the developing world, the people that the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) says are trapped, the women that the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur) describes, and then go home and talk about practicing our faith and family values and morality. It just does not work.

Mr. Speaker, CAFTA specifically protects, if you look at the text of CAFTA, it specifically protects the prescription drug companies, but offers no real protection to workers. It specifically protects and supports Hollywood films and CD-ROMs, but does not have protection for the environment and for food safety. I mean, if that does not tell us something about values; we will write a

trade agreement that will help the most privileged, wealthiest people in both our country and the six CAFTA countries, but we will not protect the workers, we will not protect and help and enhance the environment, food safety, safe drinking water, clean air, all of that.

We are joined by my friend, the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Stupak) who also has been in this Chamber, came with me in 1992 and has been a part of these discussions on trade for many, many years, and I thank the gentleman for joining us.

I thank the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Stupak). And before calling the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky), I would like to reiterate a couple of things that the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Stupak) said, talking about people playing by the rules, and American workers who played by the rules and were involved in their community and raised their kids and worked their jobs and put their time in, that they lose their jobs; people who have played by the rules in Central America, who have been exploited in these jobs that have been outsourced; and all the groups, all the religious leaders and all six of these, the six Central American countries and including the Dominican Republic; and the United States religious leaders that oppose these because they know that people that have played straight and played by the rules have been hurt by these trade agreements in the past.

And I want to mention one thing before turning to the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky) because of what the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Stupak) said and the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan), and the opposition to these agreements from the public. People know they are getting hurt by these agreements, people in Niles, Ohio, that work at Lordstown, people in Lorain or in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan or in Chicago that have been hurt by these agreements, people in Central America that have been hurt by these agreements. Because of that it is clear if this vote were to come to the House today, there is no doubt that we would defeat this trade agreement by 30 or 40 votes. But that is today. And the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Stupak) pointed out the White House is beginning all kinds of ways to convince this Congress to do something to vote for the agreement.

Just a couple of days ago Tom Donahue with the Chamber of Commerce told a bunch of Members of Congress, if you vote against CAFTA, it will cost you. Those kinds of threats. At the same time the President and his people are now putting out carrots, not just sticks. They are, in a sense, bribing Members of Congress with everything from promising highways and bridges and other kinds of pork to now saying that they are going to put $20 million in labor enforcement assistance into something called the Department of Labor's Bureau of International Affairs.

Now the administration cut the ILAB from $148 million in 2001 down to $12 million, from 148- to $12 million. Now they are saying they are going to add 20 million to it, as if that is helping something, when they have no interest, they have written a trade agreement that does not enforce labor standards or provide labor standards. Now they are saying they are putting a little money in even after they have cut it. At the same time something called the International Labor Organization, which is a multinational group that sets labor standards, were one of, I believe, two countries out of 80 that said we are going to vote against the funding for that international body.

So it is pretty clear all the promises they want to make about enforcing labor standards, they wrote weak standards, they cut funding on enforcement. Now they are trying to buy off a few Members' votes by promising to put a little money in enforcing labor standards.

I yield to the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky), who has been a stellar outspoken advocate for workers' rights and the environment, both internationally and in the gentlewoman's Illinois district and around this country.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky). She is exactly right. I think the point she made is so important.

First of all, at the beginning of her comments, she said there is a growing bipartisan group, and it is clearly way larger than a majority of this Congress, large numbers of people in both parties, who do not like our trade policy, who see that we have seen this incredible growth in the deficit from $38 billion to $618 billion in 12 years. It is clear our policies are not working.

We have seen the kind of job loss that the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Stupak) and others have talked about, particularly in these red States, with losing 200,000 jobs.

She talked about that we are not against trade agreements; we are against this Central American Free Trade Agreement. We are against this trade agreement because we know who the winners and losers are. The winners have been the drug companies, the largest most powerful corporations. The losers are small manufacturers that are from my district and in Chicago or in the upper peninsula of Michigan. The losers are workers all over the country.

When these workers lose, it is not just 216,000 Ohioans who lost their jobs. It is the families. It is the children. It is the school districts, the police and fire protection, and the safety of these communities.

It is clear, Mr. Speaker, that we can simply do better, that we should reject the Central American Free Trade Agreement as presented to us for this vote; renegotiate CAFTA; come back here and pass a trade agreement that lifts standards up, that lifts workers' standards up in our country and Central America; that protects and preserves the environment; that speaks to food safety and all the things that matter in our lives.

In closing, I would add both comments from the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Stupak) and the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky) about what do we stand for as a Nation, what kind of values, and when I look at the fact that religious leaders in all seven of these countries, the six countries south of us and our country, religious leaders have spoken out saying they are not against trade either, but they can do better, they believe we can do better and come up with a negotiated trade agreement so that working families and the poor in these countries, the environment benefits, food safety benefits. We do better with all of those things that we care about.

So I thank my friends for joining us tonight, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan), the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur), the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Stupak), the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky), and just again saying we should renegotiate CAFTA, start again. It has been a year and a month since this agreement was signed by the President. We can do better. Let us start again and do it right this time.

Mr. Speaker, I very much appreciate the good work of my friend, the gentleman from Vermont (Mr. Sanders).

Mr. Speaker, earlier this week the Committee on Appropriations passed an amendment to prevent the U.S. trade representative from using trade pacts as a tool to block prescription drug reimportation. The fact that appropriators in this body felt compelled to take this dramatic step points to a larger issue. Congress should not have to police the U.S. trade representative to make sure he or she is acting in the best interests of U.S. consumers. We should not have to instruct our trade representative to make sure that he is looking out for U.S. workers and U.S. manufacturers. We should not have to tell the trade representative to protect the environment and our food supply.

Congress should not have to scour every trade pact to make sure that some patent extension or importation barrier or other Big Government crutch designed specifically for the drug industry has not been inserted into the trade agreement by the U.S. trade representative or by the President or by my friends on the other side of the aisle.

Congress should not have to take the U.S. trade representative to task for trying to reverse the world's progress against the global AIDS epidemic, progress partially financed with U.S. tax dollars. Congress should not have to fight the U.S. trade representative in order to ensure jobs for our Nation's workforce, affordable medicine for our Nation's consumers, and manufacturing capacity for our Nation's protection.

Who does the U.S. trade representative work for?

The USTR should be acting in the interest of all Americans. If the international drug industry benefits too, all the better. Instead, the multinational drug industry's interests trump those every day of everyday Americans. The tail is wagging the dog. In fact, our trade representative's office includes a position, and I am not making this up, our trade representative's office includes a position called U.S. Trade Representative for Asia, Pacific and Pharmaceutical Policies. So we are bringing the drug industry into the USTR to make sure these trade agreements protect the drug industry, usually at the expense of American consumers who pay twice as much, three times as much, four times as much for prescription drugs, and even more seriously, frankly, who harm the world's poorest people.

In the CAFTA agreement, as the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Levin) said earlier, in Africa, in Asia, the world's poorest people have to pay more for prescription drugs because the U.S. has, in our trade representative's office, a U.S. trade representative for Asia, Pacific and pharmaceutical policy. It begs the question, What are our trade agreements for?

Mr. Speaker, it is not like they are working. Look what has happened to our trade deficit in the last 12 years. I came to Congress in 1992. We had a trade deficit of $38 billion. In 2004, 12 years later, our trade deficit was $618 billion. From $38 billion to $618 billion, and my friends are arguing our trade policy is working?

Look at our stagnating wages, the fact that the top 10 percent of people in this society are doing very well. Their incomes are going up and up and up. The 90 percent of the rest of the country, their wages are stagnant and partly because of trade policies. Look at our crippling job loss in my State, and especially in manufacturing.

Not only has our trade deficit gone from $38 billion to $618 billion in only a dozen years, look at what has happened in manufacturing. The States in red have all lost 20 percent of their manufacturing in the last 5 years. My State of Ohio, 216; Pennsylvania, 200; Michigan, 210; Alabama and Mississippi combined, 130; Illinois, 225; Virginia, 80,000; New York, 220,000. Our trade policy, Mr. Speaker, simply is not working.

When Members think about this, maybe in fact some people would say our trade agreements are working. After all, these trade agreements do work for the pharmaceutical industry.

Mr. Chairman, I thank my friend from Ohio for his commonsense amendment. If this Congress were not a captive of special interests, the Chabot/Brown amendment would pass unanimously.

We in this body, we preach balanced budgets; yet we spent, as the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Chabot) said, $1 billion on this program, on this welfare program. We preach in this body prudent spending, yet we are suggesting spending $125 million for fiscal year 2006 on this program. We preach free enterprise in this body day after day after day, yet we are using government dollars to advertise on behalf of private interests.

The Market Access Program, as the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Chabot) said, gives away $100 million annually to groups like the Catfish Institute, the Popcorn Institute, the Ginseng Board to market their products overseas. We encourage these organizations, these private for- profit or not-for-profit, it does not matter, we encourage them to advertise overseas if that helps their bottom line. But they should do it on their dime, not on the taxpayer's dime. It simply does not make sense.

I know what budget cuts mean to my district in Cleveland when we have seen the cuts that happened to NASA and the kinds of job loss in my community. We have seen what Medicaid cuts cost in terms of quality health care. Yet we are going to spend $125 million on a program that clearly shows no real benefit to those organizations. If they did show benefit, they would be spending their own money.

Mr. Chairman, I urge my colleagues to support the Chabot amendment, to join National Taxpayers Union, Citizens Against Government Waste, Taxpayers For Common Sense, U.S. PIRG, and a whole host of other groups in passing this amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. My remarks will be brief. I thank the gentleman from Texas (Chairman Bonilla) for his support.

We all know the importance of antibiotics to our public health, beginning some 60 years ago with penicillin and other antibiotics. We also know the increasing problem of antibiotic resistance in people who have not been cured because of their resistance to antibiotics that have been administered to them.

This amendment says the USDA can only buy chicken products for school nutrition programs if it complies with the requirement of existing law that foods purchased for these programs be ``wholesome,'' meaning protected from antibiotic resistance. This amendment tells the USDA that we are serious, this Congress is serious about protecting the American people from the dangers of antibiotic resistance. I ask my colleagues to support the amendment.

On March 14, 1942, the world changed.

A woman named Anne Miller had been hospitalized in New Haven, Connecticut, for more than a month with a strep infection. Every conventional treatment had failed, and doctors feared she would not last the day.

But then, Anne Miller got an experimental injection of a new medicine called Penicillin. And in just over 12 hours, her temperature had returned to normal.

A half-century ago, America's hospitals were jammed with patients suffering from strep, pneumonia, meningitis, typhoid fever, rheumatic fever, and other killers.

Penicillin and other antibiotics allowed us to bring these lethal infections under control and save millions of lives. These new miracle drugs changed the world.

But a new danger--antibiotic resistance--is threatening to turn back the clock, by making the antibiotics we rely on ineffective.

When an antibiotic is used on a person or animal, it may kill some of the bacteria, but it will not kill all of them. The survivors reproduce, propagating these hardier ``antibiotic resistant'' bacteria.

Antibiotic resistance is a serious and growing public health problem: 38 Americans die every day from antibiotic resistant infections, according to the World Health Organization--some estimates suggest the number is more than twice that large; Antibiotic resistance costs America's health care system an estimated $4 billion every year; The Centers for Disease Control has called antibiotic resistance one of its ``top concerns''

Human medicine is partly to blame. Doctors are often pressured to overprescribe antibiotics, leading to the spread of resistance. And both the medical profession and the CDC have taken this seriously, with outreach campaigns to educate both doctors and patients about the dangers of antibiotic overuse.

But animal agriculture is also to blame. About 70 percent of antibiotic use in America is not for people but for the cows, pigs, chickens, and other animals people eat. And about 70 percent of those antibiotics are not even used to treat sick animals, but to prevent illness or just to make healthy animals grow faster.

And the overuse of antibiotics in animal agriculture has serious consequences. Fluoroquinolones--the class of antibiotics that includes Cipro--are an important example.

Cipro, as we know all too well, is used to threat Anthrax. But Cipro is also used to treat infections by a foodborne bacterium called Campylobacter.

The FDA approved fluoroquinolones for use in human medicine in 1986. And FDA approved fluoroquinolones for use in chickens in 1995.

During the 9 years between 1986 and 1995, no more than 3 percent of Campylobacter cases in the U.S. involved resistant bacteria. But just 2 years after FDA approved fluoroquinolones for use in chickens, resistance in humans had jumped to 13 percent. By 2001, 19 percent of the Campylobacter infections in humans were antibiotic-resistant.

The FDA has begun a response to this problem--by proposing to ban fluorquinolone use in poultry. But the company that makes them has sued, and litigation could take several years to resolve.

Private industry also has recognized the problem. Leading fast food chains like McDonald's and Wendy's have told their suppliers they will not buy products made from chickens raised with fluoroquinolones. And leading chicken producers like Tyson, Gold Kist, and Purdue have also committed to stop using fluoruoquinolones.

But the National School Lunch Program lags behind, and the USDA still buys our children chicken raised with fluoroquinolones.

Congress acted in 2004--adding report language of the FY2004 Agriculture Appropriations bill that asked USDA to initiate ``a policy to not purchase chickens for these programs from companies that do not have a stated policy that they do not use fluoroquinolones in their chickens.''

That language was approved by a bipartisan majority in this House. It was approved by a bipartisan majority in the Senate. And the bill accompanying it was signed by President Bush.

Unfortunately--but not surprisingly--USDA did nothing to implement that provision.

It is time for Congress to order USDA to step up to the plate. And that is exactly what my amendment does.

Existing law requires that USDA take steps to ensure the wholesomeness of food delivered through school nutrition programs. If USDA actually applies that requirement when purchasing chicken products, I believe the agency will be unable to conclude that a substance FDA wants to take off the market because of public health concerns is wholesome.

Last year, we asked the USDA to do the right thing. The USDA ignored our request.

This year: tell the USDA that we are serious about protecting the American people from the dangers of antibiotic resistance; Let us pass this amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, we just returned from 10 days in our district, and we found the opposition to the Central American Free Trade Agreement is even greater than before we left. People at home in our districts recognize our trade policy is not working.

Just look at this chart. The first year I ran for Congress, our trade deficit was $38 billion. Today after NAFTA and PNTR and a series of trade agreements, our trade deficit is $618 billion.

These trade agreements cost jobs. They hurt our families. They hurt our communities. They hurt our schools.

Madam Speaker, we should renegotiate the Central American Free Trade Agreement; defeat this bill when it comes to Congress; renegotiate a new Central American Free Trade Agreement, one that lifts up workers in all seven countries.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself as much time as I may consume.

I thank the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Bilirakis), my friend from the Sunshine State, and encourage people to travel to my State more often perhaps.

As we head into summer months, it is crucial that Americans be aware of the risks involved in seemingly everyday activities: a day at the beach, a jog in the park, an afternoon out working in the yard.

Overexposure to the sun's dangerous ultraviolet rays is a major risk and, largely because of increasing ozone depletion brought on in part by global warming, a bigger threat than ever to the public health. Every year in the United States there are nearly 60,000 new cases of melanoma, the most serious form of skin cancer. Nearly 8,000 die every year from this disease.

When it comes to risk factors for skin cancer, and I quote from the American Cancer Society's list, ``unprotected and/or excessive exposure to ultraviolet radiation'' is at the top of that list. The sun's UV rays have been officially classified as a carcinogen by the United States Department of Health and Human Services.

Yet a national survey released yesterday shows that the number of people using sunscreen declined by over 10 percent last year even as skin cancer diagnoses continue to rise. In light of these troubling statistics, I am happy to support this resolution introduced by the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Bilirakis) and the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Eshoo). The resolution supports outreach and education efforts like National Sun Safety Week and the groups like the Sun Safety Alliance which work to keep the public informed of the risks of UV exposure.

Sun Safety Alliance teams up health care professionals, educators, and corporate partners to focus on conveying this risk. When it comes to something as basic as being out in the sun, effective public awareness strategies are critical. One of the alliance's priorities is outreach to the youngest Americans. Children are at the highest risk of overexposure to UV rays. Most people receive some 80 percent of their lifetime sun exposure before their 18th birthday. It is essential that we shape and reinforce the right habits early.

Madam Speaker, this resolution is an important step toward stopping an entirely preventable killer. Thousands of lives can be saved with the right understanding of what that prevention entails. I am pleased to support my colleagues and this resolution.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Bilirakis) for the good years when we were colleagues on the Subcommittee on Health when he was the chairman and I was the ranking member and the good work we were able to do on most days.

This resolution, as the gentleman points out, is not as important as some things. I would like to go a little further and talk about what all of this means in terms of global warming and some issues like that. I understand today is not the day to do that on this resolution.

Madam Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, at a White House news conference last week President Bush, called on this Congress to pass the Central American Free Trade Agreement this summer.

This morning in this Chamber, next to me, the most powerful Republican in the House, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay), once again promised a vote, this time by July 4. Actually, a month or so ago the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) promised that there would be a vote in May, but this time he says he actually means it.

Mr. Speaker, those of us who have been speaking out against the Central American Free Trade Agreement have a message in return. Let us scrap this agreement. Clearly, this Congress does not support it. And let us renegotiate a better Central American Free Trade Agreement.

President Bush signed this agreement fully 1 year and 2 weeks ago. Every trade agreement negotiated by this administration, Morocco, Singapore, Chile, Australia, all trade agreements negotiated by this administration have been ratified by Congress within 65 days of the President affixing his signature to them. CAFTA has languished in Congress now for 54 weeks without a vote because this wrong-headed trade agreement offends Republicans and Democrats alike.

Just look at what has happened with our trade policy in the last decade. 1992, the year I ran for Congress, we had a trade deficit in this country of $38 billion. Today, a dozen years later, last year actually, in 2004, our trade deficit was $618 billion.

From $38 billion, when the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur) and others of us in this Chamber opposed the North American Free Trade Agreement, from $38 billion a dozen years ago to $618 billion today.

It is clear our trade policy is not working. Mr. Speaker, opponents of CAFTA know that it is simply an extension of the North American Free Trade Agreement, actually a dysfunctional cousin of NAFTA, which clearly did not work for our country.

Look at the chart. Look at the number of jobs we have seen lost in this country as a result of trade policy.

In the last 5 years, not all of these jobs are trade policy, but many of them are. In the last 5 years, the States in red have lost more than 20 percent of their manufacturing jobs. New York, 222,000. Pennsylvania 200,000. Ohio, 217,000. Michigan, 210,000. North and South Carolina, 306,000 combined. Alabama and Mississippi, another 125,000. State after State after State has lost hundreds of thousands of manufacturing jobs.

It is the same old story. Every time there is a trade agreement, every time there is a trade agreement, the President says it will mean more jobs for Americans, it will mean more exports for the U.S., it will mean more manufacturing done in our country and selling those products overseas, and the President promises it will be better wages for workers in the developing countries.

Mr. Speaker, Ben Franklin said the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and over again and expecting a different outcome. The President makes the same promises on NAFTA, on PNTR, on trade promotion authority, the same promises, every trade agreement. And every time it comes out exactly the opposite. That is why there is overwhelming bipartisan opposition to the Central American Free Trade Agreement.

Since then, the administration and the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) and Republican leadership have tried every trick in the book to pass CAFTA. The administration started off by linking CAFTA to helping democracy in the developing world. Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, Deputy Secretary of State Zoellick both have said CAFTA will help on the war on terrorism. I am not really sure why, but they said that we need to pass this agreement with Central America to help us in the war on terrorism. But we know 10 years of NAFTA has done nothing to improve security between Mexico and the United States, so that argument simply does not sell.

In May, then, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce set up a junket for the six presidents from Central America and the Dominican Republic, taking them to Cincinnati and Los Angeles and Washington and Albuquerque and around the United States, hoping they might be able to sell the American people the press and the Congress on CAFTA. Again they failed.

Earlier this year, the majority leader, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay), and the Ways and Means Chairman, the gentleman from California (Mr. Thomas), said there would be a vote on CAFTA by Memorial Day. Memorial Day came and went without a vote. Why? Because they did not have the votes.

Now we have a new deadline for this failed trade agreement. It is July 4th.

Mr. Speaker, Republicans and Democrats, business and labor groups, farmers, ranchers, faith-based groups, the National Council of Churches, the Latin American Council of Churches, churches, business groups, religious leaders environmental groups, all have said, if CAFTA countries and the U.S. renegotiate CAFTA, we can get a better agreement next time.

Mr. Speaker, President Bush is asking this Congress to pass the Central American Free Trade Agreement, a dysfunctional cousin of the North American Free Trade Agreement, in spite of the fact that our trade policy has failed.

Twelve years ago, the U.S. had a $38 billion trade deficit. After NAFTA, China and a host of other trade agreements, our trade deficit is now $618 billion.

Mr. Speaker, someone defined insanity as if you do the same thing over and over and over again, you expect a different outcome. It is clear our trade policy has failed. The Central American Free Trade Agreement, an extension of NAFTA, will continue the failed trade policy. We should pass trade agreements that lift up standards around the world, create jobs, both in the developing world and in the United States and change the direction of our trade policy.

Mr. Speaker, the President and Republican leadership were going to ask this Chamber to vote on the Central America Free Trade Agreement this week, but apparently because it does not have the votes, they will ask us to vote on it in June or July or whenever.

The administration continues, however, to mislead all of us with the wrong-headed notion that by exploiting the poor workers and promoting the agendas of the largest multinational corporations, that America will expand democracy and increase national security. If the administration is going to pursue this kind of illogical rhetoric, they should answer some questions for us.

How do we promote national security by privatizing these poor nations' water systems and public services? How do we promote democracy by inserting provisions in the Central American Free Trade Agreement that call for secret international tribunals to make decisions affecting America's public health and safety laws, thereby undercutting and subverting America's sovereignty?

How do we promote democracy by extending drug patents beyond U.S. law in Central America, making it more difficult for AIDS patients and the terminally ill in these nations to receive life-saving medicines?

How do we promote democracy when pharmaceutical companies and other industries well connected to the Bush administration are granted a seat at the negotiating table while workers' representatives are excluded?

More than 40 percent of workers in Central America earn less than $2 a day, putting them below the global poverty level. How does CAFTA ensure that wages will increase to benefit workers?

If CAFTA helps workers, why does it allow the Central American nations to weaken or undercut their already substandard labor laws after the agreements is enacted?

Why are trade sanctions an effective trade enforcement mechanism available for violations of intellectual priority provisions of agreement, but not for violations of labor and environmental provisions? In other words, why do we protect drug companies and not protect workers?

While opponents of CAFTA gather by the hundreds in public places, elected Democrats, elected Republicans, union members, environmental groups, manufacturers, small farmers, ranchers, environmentalists, we meet out in the open, but CAFTA supporters hunker down behind closed doors to manipulate backdoor deals.

With all the talk of democracy, why the secrecy, Mr. Speaker?

Proponents of the status quo argue that free trade promotes democracy, but then they turn a blind eye to human rights abuses, to coerced labor, to slave labor, to child labor. Supporters of CAFTA conveniently fail to mention that democracy in Mexico recently suffered a severe setback when Mexico's legislatures voted to strip the popular Mayor of Mexico City, and their political rival, of official immunity on a technicality; the goal was to imprison him and knock him out of the 2006 election.

The U.S. State Department remains silent. Mexico now ranks as one of the world's ten largest economies. While overall wealth increased since passing the North America Free Trade Agreement, poverty has also increased. In Mexico, 10 percent of the population controls 50 percent of the Nation's wealth and 50 percent of the nation's citizens live in poverty. That was the legacy of NAFTA, the dysfunctional cousin of

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Today, Mr. Speaker, we will consider two bills that have significant bearing on the future of medicine and medical research in our country. I want to thank the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith) and the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Barton) for their work on the first of these bills. The Smith-Barton legislation reauthorizes the National Bone Marrow Donor Program and adds a new national cord blood registry. Cord blood and bone marrow have several therapeutic uses in common: first and foremost, the treatment of blood diseases. Coordinating these two registries makes sense for patients, for doctors, and for the public health. With this kind of coordinated program, there will be a single entry point for transplant doctors and their patients to locate available cord blood units.

This bill also increases outreach and education efforts so that we can amass the most diverse possible reserves of cord blood. It improves data keeping and distribution so that necessary blood gets to patients as quickly and as accurately as possible. In addition to the therapeutic uses of cord blood, this bill makes cord blood stem cells available for research purposes.

There is clearly therapeutic potential in the use of cord blood and adult stem cells. Some of the most important research in this area is taking place in Ohio, in northeast Ohio, where I call home, at the National Center for Regenerative Medicine, a partnership of Case Western Reserve University hospitals, and the Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland.

I mentioned we will be considering two bills today that have significant bearing on the future of medicine. And it is in the research area that the distinctions between these two bills takes on the greatest significance.

Smith-Barton focuses on cord-blood and adult stem cell research. In the Castle-DeGette bipartisan bill, it focuses on embryonic stem cell research. That is a critical distinction, and the House needs to acknowledge that. Cord-blood and adult stem cell research are not substitutes for embryonic stem cell research. They are not alternative avenues to the same medical outcomes. Each type of research holds unique potential.

For example, while adult stem cells represent an important advance in the treatment of blood disorders, these cells simply do not occur in every tissue in the body. Because there are no adult stem cells, for example, in the pancreas, the potential of adult stem cells to develop into therapies for a disease like diabetes is very limited. That is one example of many.

Embryonic stem cell, on the other hand, can grow into any type of cell in the body, making potential use of these far more diverse and far more valuable.

We should not minimize the importance of cord-blood and adult stem cell research, but by the same token, we shouldn't mislead the public into believing that if Smith-Barton passes, the Castle-DeGette bill is unnecessary, because surely it is not. It is irresponsible and even dangerous for Members of this body to distort the value of one form of research in order to stifle another promising avenue of research.

We in this Congress have a responsibility to support medical research and to foster its development, as the committee of the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Barton) committee has done well over time. Millions of lives have been saved and improved because of the brilliant research conducted in this country. We also have a responsibility to speak honestly about that research and its potential.

Both sides of this debate owe it to the public to draw clear lines between the beliefs we hold and the facts that hold, regardless of what we believe. The fact is that cord-blood research, adult stem cell research and embryonic stem cell research are not interchangeable. The fact is, if we invest in all three types of research, we may finally be able to find cures for debilitating illnesses, cures that are currently beyond our reach.

The fact is, if the U.S. withholds funding for embryonic stem cell research, that research will continue, just at a significantly slower pace. People that you and I know, they may be friends, they may be family members, they may be professional colleagues, will suffer and die from potentially curable illnesses while we wait for the rest of the world to fill our shoes.

Researchers in other nations, researchers in private institutions in this country, are pursuing embryonic stem cell research because they know that it is possible to accomplish this research in an ethical manner. Embryonic stem cell research does not and need not increase the number of embryos that are destroyed. Instead, it decreases the number of embryos that are destroyed in vain.

We will have an opportunity today to pass two pieces of legislation, both are important, that will deliver hope to patients whose futures depend on new answers to life and death medical questions. Our Nation cannot pick and choose between cord-blood research and adult stem cell research and embryonic stem cell research if we want to answer all these questions, unless we want to offer hope to some and sympathy to others.

Mr. Speaker, I urge Members to vote in favor of both the Smith-Barton bill

and the Castle-DeGette bill. Doing so will show that what you know and what you believe intersects at the point where medical progress is harnessed to alleviate untold human suffering.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Matsui).

(Ms. MATSUI asked and was given permission to revise and extend 2 remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Davis).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from the Virgin Islands (Mrs. Christensen).

Mr. Speaker, could the Chair inform both sides how much time is remaining?

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Engel), a member of the Health Subcommittee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gene Green), an outstanding member of the Health Subcommittee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Michigan (Ms. Kilpatrick).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from Ohio (Mrs. Jones).

Mr. Speaker, how many speakers does the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Barton) have remaining and, Mr. Speaker, who has the right to close?

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, we wonder, as most medical scientists wonder, why not both kinds of research. We in no way want to restrict it to just one or the other like my friends on the other side of the aisle.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, how much time remains?

Mr. Speaker, I have two remaining speakers.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 1-\1/4\ minutes.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to share the words from the President who seems to have sent a different message than my friends on the other side of the aisle.

President Bush said, ``Most scientists believe that research on embryonic stem cells offers the most promise because these cells have the potential to develop in all of the tissues in the body.''

I hear my friends on the other side of the aisle argue that we really only need cord blood stem cell research, that that will lead us to all that we need.

And the President said about that, that ``No adult stem cell has been shown in culture to be pluripotent.'' And he said, ``Embryonic stem cells have the potential to develop into all or nearly all of the tissues in the body.''

I then hear my friends on the other side of the aisle talk about research, that this is going to lead to so much more research. Yet at the same time we have seen no increase, flat-lined spending, budgeting on the National Institutes of Health, something that many of us, the gentlewoman from Colorado (Ms. DeGette) and many of the rest of us, have thought we should increase spending on, medical research all across the board in all kinds of medical research.

Yes, in order to make room for the President's tax cuts that have gone overwhelmingly to the wealthiest in our country, we have simply cut medical research and not done what we should as a Nation do overall in medical research.

So when I hear my friends talk on this, I do not quite get how this will expand medical research while closing out one whole avenue of medical research and, at the same time, cutting spending on what we should be doing to move our country ahead.

Mr. Speaker, I yield the remainder of my time to the gentlewoman from Colorado (Ms. DeGette), the sponsor of this bill.

Mr. Speaker, last year President Bush signed the Central American Free Trade Agreement, a one-sided plan to benefit multinational corporations at the expense of United States and Central American farmers, small businesses and workers. Every trade agreement negotiated by this administration has been ratified by Congress within 65 days, within about 2 months of the President's signing it. But CAFTA, the Central American Free Trade Agreement, has languished in Congress for 1 year without a vote because this wrong-headed trade agreement offends both Republicans and Democrats.

Just look at what has happened with our trade policy in the last dozen years. In 1992, the year I was first elected to Congress, we had in this country a trade deficit of $38 billion. That means that we imported $38 billion of goods more than we exported. $38 billion in 1992. Then NAFTA passed, the North American Free Trade Agreement, then permanent normal trade relations with China, then a whole 'nother series of trade agreements.

Last year, our trade deficit was $618 billion, from $38 billion to $618 billion in 12 short years.

Our trade policy clearly is bankrupt, clearly is not working for American workers, clearly is not working for our families, for our school systems, for our communities, and clearly is not working in the developing world for workers in those countries. It is the same old story.

Now the President is asking us to pass the Central American Free Trade Agreement. With each trade agreement that the President asks us to pass, the President and his allies promise stronger manufacturing in the United States, more jobs for Americans, more prosperity for the U.S. economy and for communities in this country and better wages for workers in developing countries. Yet with every single trade agreement, their promises fall by the wayside in favor of big business interests that send U.S. jobs overseas, that lock in low wages in the developing world and that exploit that cheap labor abroad.

Madness, Mr. Speaker, is repeating the same action over and over and over and expecting a different result. Again, look at this trade deficit. Look what has happened after 12 years of failed trade policies. From a $38 billion trade deficit to $618 billion. President Bush, Sr., said that for every $1 billion of trade deficits, that translates into 12,000 jobs. If you have a surplus of $1 billion, you have 12,000 extra jobs. If you have a deficit of $1 billion, you lose 12,000 jobs. We have a deficit of $618 billion. Do the math.

Mr. Speaker, what has happened with this trade deficit shows in this map. These red States are States which have lost, in just a 5-year period, 6-year period, more than 20 percent of their manufacturing. Michigan, 210,000 jobs. Illinois, 224,000 jobs lost. My State, the State of the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan), 216,000 jobs. The State of the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Larson), 50,000 jobs. The State of the gentleman from California (Mr. Filner) and the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lee), 353,000 jobs. The State of the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Davis), 224,000. Hundreds of thousands of jobs lost with this trade policy, with this kind of export trade policy, import trade policy, where trade deficits continue to grow and grow and grow.

That is why, Mr. Speaker, in the face of this growing bipartisan opposition, the administration, the Republican leadership has tried every trick in the book to pass CAFTA. They cannot argue our trade policy is working when you see this kind of manufacturing job loss.

So what they do, they first try to link CAFTA with helping democracy in the developing world and they say, CAFTA will help us fight the war on terror. Ten years of NAFTA, 10 years of CAFTA's dysfunctional cousin NAFTA, have done nothing to improve border security with Mexico, so that argument does not sell.

Then, 2 weeks ago, the United States Chamber of Commerce flew on a junket the six presidents from the CAFTA countries around our country, hoping they would sell CAFTA to the American people and to the Congress and to the American media. They flew them to Albuquerque and Los Angeles. They flew them to Cincinnati, Ohio, in my State and New York and Miami. Again, they failed.

At the end of this trip, one of the presidents, the Costa Rican president said, Hey, my country is not ratifying CAFTA unless an independent commission would show that it would not hurt working families and the poor in my country of Costa Rica. So that is not working.

Calling out that we have got to do something about the war on terror and that is why we are doing this agreement, that did not work. Bringing the Central American presidents to the United States, that did not work.

So what is next? The Republican leadership is opening the bank. They are making deals. To my friends on that side of the aisle, they are promising bridges, they are promising highways, they are promising some of the sleaziest deals this Congress has ever seen. They are basically buying votes in this Congress in order to pass the Central American Free Trade Agreement. We saw it in 2002 with fast track authority when the President opened the bank and bought votes then. We are not going to stand for it this time.

Mr. Speaker, what really makes sense instead is a trade policy that lifts workers up in rich and poor countries alike while it is respecting human rights. The United States with its unrivaled purchasing power and its enormous economic clout is in a unique position to help empower poor workers in developing countries while promoting prosperity at home.

Vote ``no'' on CAFTA. Renegotiate a better agreement.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Waters) for her eloquence in opposition to the Central American Free Trade Agreement. She obviously understands this much better than some of my other colleagues who have not been so eloquent and thoughtful in their comments about this agreement.

I rise tonight to address the House about the Central American Free Trade Agreement. Last year President Bush signed the Central American Free Trade Agreement, a one-sided plan, as the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Waters) said, that will lead to more outsourcing. That is what this plan is all about, and not a plan to export American products or help American industry. It is a one-sided plan to benefit multinational corporations at the expense of the United States and Central American workers, small businesses and farmers.

Every trade agreement negotiated by this administration has been ratified by Congress within 65 days of its signing. In other words, when President Bush's United States trade representative negotiated the Moroccan trade agreement, when the President signed the Australia trade agreement, the Singapore trade agreement and the Chilean trade agreement, all four of those trade agreements, upon signature of the President, were voted on by this Congress and passed within 60 days.

The Central American Free Trade Agreement, which we will discuss for a few moments tonight, has languished in Congress for nearly 1 year without a vote because this wrong-headed trade

agreement offends large numbers of Republicans and Democrats in this House, and a significantly higher percentage in the United States of America.

Look at what has happened with our trade policy in the past decade. I was elected to Congress in 1992, 13 years ago. The year I was elected, the United States had a trade deficit of $38 billion. That means our country imported $38 billion more goods than we exported. Today, or last year in 2004, our country's trade deficit was $618 billion. So it went from $38 billion to $618 billion.

So what is the President's response to that and what is the Republican leadership's response? Let us do more trade agreements. As if they are working. It does not make sense. Opponents to the Central American Free Trade Agreement understand these numbers. We know what has happened. We can look at the numbers in 1992 when it was $38 billion. The next year Congress passed the North American Free Trade Agreement, and the deficit began to grow. It exceeded $100 billion in 1995. A few years later, it exceeded $200 billion. Around this time Congress passed the China trade agreement, the China PNTR, Permanent Normal Trade Relations with China. Then our trade deficit passed $300 billion, approaching $400 billion. In 2003 it exceed $500 billion; 2004 it exceeded $600 billion. And we are on a path in 2005 to see our trade deficit continue to explode to over $700 billion.

It is the same old story. Every time there is a trade agreement, the President of the United States promises more jobs for Americans, promises more manufacturing done in our country, promises a higher standard of living for Americans, promises better wages for workers in developing countries, and promises a higher standard of living in poor countries.

Yet with every trade deficit, every single time, NAFTA, China, and every other trade agreement, with every trade agreement the promises fall by the wayside in favor of large business interests, not small manufacturing, machine shop owners, but big business interests. They fall by the wayside in favor of big businesses interests that send U.S. jobs overseas and exploit cheap labor abroad.

This chart, this is the last 6-or-so years and what has happened to manufacturing in our country. The States in red are States that have lost a particularly high percentage, more than 20 percent of their manufacturing. All of these States have lost more than 20 percent of their manufacturing jobs as these trade agreements have kicked in and taken effect. Michigan, 210,000; Illinois, 224,000; Ohio, 216,000; Pennsylvania, 199,600; New York, 220,000; North Carolina, 228,000. Smaller States, Mississippi, Alabama, South Carolina, West Virginia, Maine, and Massachusetts, have lost somewhere in the vicinity of 50,000 to 150,000 manufacturing jobs.

Mr. Speaker, these are just numbers. These numbers may say, okay, trade policy is not working, that is pretty clear, but put a human face with these numbers. Every time a community, Elyria, Ohio, in my district, when York manufacturing shut down and moved some jobs to other States, most of those jobs to Mexico, 700 families lost their major source of income. Those families were hurt. Those children in those families were hurt. The school district in Elyria was hurt. Police and fire protection in those communities are cut back.

These numbers, whether it is 100,000; 200,000 in Washington State; or 35,000 in Oklahoma; 200,000 in Texas; 72,000 in Florida, these are numbers; but there are human faces with these numbers. Every time a manufacturing plant closes and moves overseas, children are hurt, families are hurt, schools are hurt, communities are hurt. It does not make sense.

In the face of growing bipartisan opposition, the administration and Republican leadership have tried every trick in the book to pass the Central American Free Trade Agreement. First of all, the administration, when they saw the merits of the argument were simply not working with Congress, the American people and this Congress rejected out of hand for the last 12 months, that is why we have not voted on the Central American Free Trade Agreement for a whole year, it is clear they rejected out of hand those arguments that the administration and the largest corporations in our country were making about the Central American Free Trade Agreement.

So what did the administration do? They linked the Central American Free Trade Agreement to fighting the war on terror. They said that if we do not pass the Central American Free Trade Agreement, it would cause problems in fighting the war on terror. Well, that argument, nobody really bought that argument. Republicans and Democrats did not buy it, in part because 10 years of the North American Free Trade Agreement has done nothing to improve border security between the United States and Mexico. That argument simply does not sell.

So the administration tried something else. First their arguments were not working. Then they tried to play the terrorism card, that we need this trade agreement with these six countries in order to fight the war on terror. The next thing they tried was 2 weeks ago the United States Chamber of Commerce, allies of the President on passing this agreement, representing the largest companies in America, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce put together a junket for those presidents to travel to the United States.

Those six presidents, five Central American presidents and the Dominican Republic president flew around the United States hoping to sell CAFTA. Large businesses in the U.S. had not changed the American people's minds. The President's arguments were not working, so these six presidents traveled to Albuquerque, New York, Los Angeles, Miami, Cincinnati, Ohio in my State. And, finally, they returned to Washington. But again they failed.

The Costa Rican president announced that his country would not ratify CAFTA unless an independent commission could determine that the agreement would not hurt working people in Costa Rica. As these six presidents flew around the country, they did not convince the newspapers, the American public, or Congress. And one of their own said I am not so sure we should ratify this agreement either.

Now the next step is the most powerful Republican in the House, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay), the House majority leader, joined by the Committee on Ways and Means chairman, the gentleman from California (Mr. Thomas), said there would be a vote on CAFTA by Memorial Day, which is the 1-year anniversary of the President signing the Central American Free Trade Agreement.

We are barely 1 week away from that 1-year anniversary, and still no vote in sight. I would add that this agreement, unlike every other trade agreement, has been languishing in this Congress. Every other trade agreement sent by President Bush was passed within 60 days. This trade agreement has been 11 months and 20-some days still without a vote because the people of this country, in this Congress, the people's representatives, simply do not buy that our trade policy is working.

Mr. Speaker, look at these numbers. How can you make the argument that trade policy in America is working when we have gone from a $38 billion to a $618 billion trade deficit in only 12 years when we have pursued these kinds of NAFTA-like trade policies. Understand, CAFTA rhymes with NAFTA for a reason. CAFTA is very similar to NAFTA. It is the same kind of trade agreement; we will see the same kind of results. It is simply not working.

Last month two dozen Democrats and Republicans in Congress joined more than 150 business groups and labor organizations on the steps of one of the House office buildings saying vote ``no'' on the Central American Free Trade Agreement. Last week more than 400 workers and Members of Congress gathered again in front of the Capitol saying vote ``no'' on CAFTA.

Why? It is simple. Because Republicans and Democrats, business and labor groups know what the administration refuses to admit. What the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Waters) said, CAFTA is about one thing and one thing only: CAFTA is about access to cheap labor. We know that CAFTA is about access to cheap labor simply because Central American countries cannot afford to buy American goods. Let me explain what that means.

About 5 years ago, Mr. Speaker, I flew at my own expense to McAllen,

Texas, rented a car and went across the border to Reynosa, Mexico. I wanted to see the face of globalization. I wanted to see what the North American Free Trade Agreement after 5 or 6 years in effect, what it really meant for our country, what it meant to Mexico, what it meant to our relations, and on the border.

I went to Reynosa, Mexico. I visited a couple who worked at General Electric Mexico, 3 miles from the United States. Their home was a small shack, maybe 20 feet by 15 feet. They lived in a home with no electricity, no running water, with dirt floors. When it rained hard, the dirt floors turned to mud. As I walked around their neighborhood, I saw other shacks that looked a lot like theirs. Amazingly enough, I could tell where the workers worked because their shacks were built, their homes were built out of packing material from the companies for which they worked. Cardboard boxes, crates, wooden platforms, that is how they constructed their roof and walls and their homes.

As I walked around their neighborhood, I saw a ditch behind their home that was maybe 4 feet wide. Who knows what human waste and industrial waste was running through this ditch. Children were playing nearby. The American Medical Association said the area around the U.S- Mexican border is the most toxic place in the western hemisphere.

We then went to a General Motors plant not far from these workers' homes. The General Motors plant looked just like a General Motors plant in Ohio. It looks just like the Lordstown plant in northeast Ohio. It looked just like a Chrysler plant in Twinsburg. It looked just like a Ford plant in Avon Lake or Lorain, Ohio.

As you walked through this plant, it was modern; the technology was up to date. The floors were clean; the workers were working hard. There was one difference between the plant in Mexico and the plant in Lorain, Ohio. The difference was there was no parking lot at the plant in Mexico. Why? Because Mexican workers were not making enough, 3 miles from the United States, were not making enough to buy the cars that they make, 3 miles from the United States.

You could go halfway around the world to a Motorola plant in Malaysia, the workers were not earning enough to buy the cell phones that they make. You could come halfway back around the world to Costa Rica to a Disney plant, the workers were not earning enough to buy the toys for their children that they were making. You could fly halfway around the world again to the People's Republic of China, to Communist China to a Nike plant, and the workers were not making enough to buy the shoes that they make.

The Central American Free Trade Agreement represents that kind of trade policy. Nicaraguans, Guatemalans, Hondurans make about one-tenth what Americans make. An American makes about $38,000 average a year. In many cases, middle-class Americans make enough to buy a car, to buy a home, to send their kids to college, to purchase washing machines and to purchase appliances and to purchase carpet and all the things that they buy. Unfortunately, Guatemalans and Hondurans and Nicaraguans, because their wages are so low, because the global economy is not working for them, they simply cannot afford to make these purchases. So this Central American Free Trade Agreement, it is about sending American jobs to Nicaragua, Guatemala, Honduras, Costa Rica and the Dominican Republic. It is about sending these jobs there where these workers simply are not going to make enough money to buy American products. It is not about those people in those countries purchasing goods made in the United States. We are losing manufacturing jobs. Our overall trade deficit continues to increase. You can bet that Guatemalan workers cannot afford to buy cars made in Ohio. Nicaraguan workers cannot afford to buy steel made in West Virginia. Honduran workers cannot afford to buy software made in Seattle or prime beef cuts from Nebraska or apparel from Georgia or textiles from North Carolina, simply because in these trade agreements we are doing nothing to lift up wages in these six countries. No enforceable labor standards, no enforceable environmental standards, no efforts by the Central American Free Trade Agreement to lift up worker standards so those workers can join the middle class and they can begin to buy American products. These trade agreements are all about shipping jobs overseas, are all about outsourcing labor, are all about American companies and Taiwanese companies and South Korean companies and other countries' companies going to Central America to exploit cheap labor and to exploit those workers. There is a falling minimum wage, the ongoing nightmare of abject poverty for these workers despite backbreaking work and deplorable working conditions.

CAFTA's nations are not only among the poorest countries, they are among the smallest economies. The entire economic output of these six CAFTA countries, five in Central America and the Dominican Republic, the entire combined economic output is $62 billion. That is equivalent to the economic output of Columbus, Ohio; equivalent to the economic output of Memphis, Tennessee; or equivalent to the economic output of Orlando, Florida.

CAFTA, as I said, it is not about exporting American production or goods, it is not about Americans making things and selling them to Central America, it is about access to cheap labor and exporting American jobs much more than it ever is exporting U.S. goods. As I said, the average worker in Nicaragua earns $3,800 a year. That is simply not enough to buy American products and it is not enough to mean any kind of exports from the United States to those countries.

Frankly, the Central American Free Trade Agreement should be called the Central American Free Labor Agreement. That is what it is all about. It is not about trade. It is about outsourcing cheap labor.

I mentioned a minute ago that these presidents from these five Central American countries and the Dominican Republic traveled to the United States on a tour to Albuquerque and Cincinnati and to Los Angeles and to Washington and Miami. With all due respect to the Central American leaders who toured our Nation 2 weeks ago, and we should welcome them, what they did not say and what millions of us know already as they campaigned for this agreement is that millions of their workers in addition to tens of millions of American workers simply do not like this trade agreement. What they did not tell reporters is that more than 8,000 Guatemalan workers protested against CAFTA in March. Two of them were killed by government security forces. They did not tell us that tens of thousands of El Salvadorans protested CAFTA 2 years ago. They did not tell us about 18,000 letters sent last year to the Honduran congress by Honduran workers that decried this dysfunctional cousin of the North American Free Trade Agreement. They did not tell us about the 10,000 people in Nicaragua who protested CAFTA in 2003. They did not tell us about the 30,000 CAFTA protesters this past fall in Costa Rica. They did not tell us that literally hundreds of thousands of workers have protested the Central American Free Trade Agreement, workers in Central America, in more than 45 demonstrations in the last 3 years.

Trade pacts like NAFTA and CAFTA enable companies to exploit cheap labor, then import those products back to the United States. I repeat, that is what these trade agreements are about. They are about shutting down American factories, moving these factories to Central America as they did to Mexico, exploiting workers, paying them barely a livable wage let alone a living wage, paying them barely a livable wage, then sending products back into the United States. As a result, America is bleeding manufacturing jobs and running unprecedented trade deficits.

Again, look at the trade deficit, from $38 billion to $618 billion in a dozen years. President Bush, Sr., back in 1992 when we had a trade deficit of $38 billion, he said, $1 billion in trade deficit translates into 12,000 lost jobs. So if you have a trade surplus of $1 billion, you increase 12,000 jobs. If you have a deficit of $1 billion, you lose 12,000 jobs. Multiply that by $618 billion and you see the kind of job loss, perhaps as much as 7 million jobs lost because of

our manufacturing and trade policy in this country.

What we are seeing, Mr. Speaker, is America is bleeding with our trade deficit, and bleeding manufacturing jobs from our country. Again, all these States in red in the last 5 years have lost more than 20 percent of their manufacturing jobs. All the States in blue have lost at least 15 percent of their manufacturing jobs. Basically every large State, every single large State in this country: California, Texas, Florida, North Carolina, Georgia, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota. Every single large State has lost at least 15 percent, one out of six manufacturing jobs in this country in the last 5 years. Again, those manufacturing jobs, losing those jobs, they are not just numbers. They are about families, they are about children, they are about schools and they are about communities and police and fire and making our communities prosperous. Gregory Mankiw, the President's former Chief Economist, portrayed the exporting of jobs as inevitable and desirable. He said, ``When a good or service is produced more cheaply abroad, it makes more sense to import it than to provide it domestically.''

Unfortunately, that is the attitude of the administration. That is the attitude of people who have written this trade policy that have led to these kinds of manufacturing job losses and have led to these kinds of trade deficits and that is the attitude of people who are pushing the Central American Free Trade Agreement.

What really instead, Mr. Speaker, makes sense is a trade policy that lifts workers up in rich countries like ours, in poor countries like Costa Rica and Honduras and Guatemala and the Dominican Republic and Nicaragua, while respecting human rights and democratic principles. The United States with its unrivaled purchasing power, the greatest in history, and its enormous economic clout, again the greatest in history, we as a Nation are in a unique position to help empower poor workers in developing countries while promoting prosperity at home.

When the world's poorest people can buy American products rather than just make them, then we will know, Mr. Speaker, finally that our trade policies are working.

Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

The motion was agreed to; accordingly (at 10 o'clock and 8 minutes p.m.), under its previous order, the House adjourned until Monday, May 23, 2005, at 12:30 p.m., for morning hour debates.

Mr. Speaker, President Bush, Senator Frist, and the majority leader, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) are in a quest for absolute power in Washington, even if it means corrupting our government and the vision of our Founding Fathers.

The White House has manufactured a judicial crisis. Since the President took office, the Senate confirmed 208 of his judicial nominees and turned back only 10, a 95 percent confirmation rate. That rate is the highest approval rating for any President in modern times, higher than Reagan, Bush Senior and Clinton. The President presides over the lowest court vacancy rate in 25 years.

But 95 percent is not good enough for this White House. They want to have it all. That is simply not how it is supposed to work, and America sees this for what it is, an extreme power grab by the majority party. Our country knows that our country works best when no political party has absolute power.