At Preceding Teach-In, Labor, Farm & Other Experts Air Good Trade Policies Needed to Replace Both the NAFTA-Style Trade Deals that Gutted Milwaukee and Trump’s Broken Trade Promises & Continued Backroom Deals that also Prioritize Billionaires Over Working People.
Milwaukee, Wis. — Union members, farmers and other Wisconsinites gathered near the site where the Trump administration is hosting the G20 Trade Ministerial for a “Fair Trade for Working Families” demonstration expressing anger over broken trade promises and calling on the Trump administration and other officials to adopt fair trade policies that prioritize the interests of working people.
“Like many places, Milwaukee is still suffering from the devasting economic impacts of deindustrialization and the ongoing race-to-the-bottom caused by corporate-driven trade deals that offshore jobs and drive down wages,” said Pam Fendt, President of the Milwaukee Area Labor Council. “We’ve had enough of the broken promises to fix these deals. As trade officials from around the world meet in our city, we’re demanding fair trade policies that put the interests of working families and communities ahead of billionaires and greedy corporations.”
Demonstrators carried tombstones with the names of Wisconsin manufacturers and other employers that have, together, shed tens of thousands of jobs under trade policies that help companies offshore work abroad to take advantage of low wages, worker rights abuses and lax pollution controls. U.S. manufacturing jobs and investment in new U.S. factory construction are both down and the trade deficit in manufactured goods is bigger since Trump returned to the White House. A large U.S. food trade deficit and brittle, vulnerable supply chains also continue.
“President Trump and many G20 officials claim they are all about defending working families — but the truth is, we’ve been ignored in recent trade negotiations,” said John Drew, Chair of the Wisconsin UAW CAP. “This administration continues to advance backroom deals and other schemes that enrich Trump and his billionaire buddies at the expense of working people everywhere. Meanwhile, manufacturing jobs continue to decline and our communities suffer.”
This demonstration was endorsed by the Milwaukee Area Labor Federation, Wisconsin’s South Central Federation of Labor, American Federation of Teachers (AFT) Local 212, Citizen Action of Wisconsin, Citizens Trade Campaign, Milwaukee Area Service and Hospitality Workers Union, Our Revolution Wisconsin, Peace Action of Wisconsin, Public Citizen, Sierra Club, Trade Justice Education Fund, United Auto Workers (UAW) Wisconsin State CAP Council, United Food & Commercial Workers (UFCW) 1473, Wisconsin Farmers Union and others.
Representatives of some of the organizations are delivering a petition to G20 officials signed by people across the Midwest calling for adoption of the “Fair Trade for Working Families” plan in ongoing and future trade negotiations.
“Working people in Wisconsin and across the globe deserve a new trade model that prioritizes good-paying jobs, higher wages, worker rights, affordable and safe food produced by independent farms, a healthy environment and accountability for Big Tech,” said Tarek Bos-Shadi, Midwest Regional Organizer for the Trade Justice Education Fund. “Fair trade champions in Congress recently introduced the ‘Fair Trade for Working Families’ plan — a blueprint for trade endorsed by leading labor, consumer, family farm and environmental organizations. We’re urging trade officials, including those from the Trump administration, to adopt the ‘Fair Trade for Working Families’ plan in current and future trade negotiations.”
The demonstration was proceeded Tuesday evening by a teach-in at the University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee called “Working Families vs. Oligarchs: The Stakes of Milwaukee’s G-20 Trade Minister Fall Summit.” Facilitated by The Nation’s Executive Editor John Nichols, the teach-in featured panelists from the UAW, Rethink Trade, Wisconsin Farmers Union, Sierra Club, and UW-Madison.
“The way forward is neither the Bush-Clinton NAFTA-style trade nor Trump chaotic and often misdirected tariffs with big carve outs for billionaire political donors, friends and family and special trade concessions to ‘impress’ autocratic Chinese Premier Xi,” said Lori Wallach, director of Rethink Trade. “The Trump administration chose Milwaukee to host the G20 Trade Ministerial to show other countries the devasting impact of corporate-driven race-to-the-bottom trade deals that offshore jobs, drive down wages and weaken our country with deindustrialization, but much of the Trump trade agenda prioritizes Big Tech and other powerful corporate interests over working people.”
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The American Economic Liberties Project works to ensure America’s system of commerce is structured to advance, rather than undermine, economic liberty, fair commerce, and a secure, inclusive democracy. Economic Liberties believes true economic liberty means entrepreneurs and businesses large and small succeed on the merits of their ideas and hard work; commerce empowers consumers, workers, farmers, and engineers instead of subjecting them to discrimination and abuse from financiers and monopolists; foreign trade arrangements support domestic security and democracy; and wealth is broadly distributed to support equitable political power. Rethink Trade was established to intensify analysis and advocacy regarding the myriad ways that today’s trade agreements and policies must be altered to undo decades of corporate capture and to deliver on broad national interests.