Sen. Bernie Sanders: "Please join me in vigorously opposing the #TPP trade agreement."

[RiverLover]

42. Many Democrats are fighting the TPP, which is why it needs the GOP to pass.

The Obama administration, though, has not had the support of Democrats in the United States Congress. Senior Democrat Representative Sander Levin has expressed reservations about the process and the substance of the TPP. Senator Elizabeth Warren has worried about how the TPP will affect the financial regulation of Wall Street. Other Democrats have additional reservations about the TPP. Senator Ron Wyden is of the view that the fast-track regime needs to be overhauled and modernised. Three House of Representatives Democrats — Reps. Rosa DeLauro (Conn.), Louise Slaughter (N.Y.) and Alan Grayson (Fla.) — maintained that there are insufficient votes in the House to pass the trade promotion authority to secure the approval of the 12-nation TPP. De Lauro commented: ‘Fast-track doesn’t have support in the current Congress and won’t have support in the next Congress’. She declared: ‘The votes are not there.’

Nonetheless, President Barack Obama has said that he is willing to defy United States Congressional Democrats on his support of the TPP, and work with Republicans if need be. However, there are significant divisions within the Republicans over the TPP. There could well be insufficient support within the United States Congress for a trade promotion authority.

<<<<Edit of a TON of good info on the TPP>>>

....On the 17 December 2014, Senator Elizabeth Warren and a number of her colleagues, Tammy Baldwin and Ed Markey, wrote to the White House, outlining a number of concerns in respect of the TPP. Warren commented: ‘We are concerned that the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) could make it harder for Congress and regulatory agencies to prevent future financial crisis.’ She observed, with her colleagues: ‘With millions of families still struggling to recover from the last financial crisis and the Great Recession that followed, we cannot afford a trade deal that undermines the government’s ability to protect the American economy.’

Warren, Baldwin, and Markey highlighted concerns with three specific provisions that could be part of the TPP. First, the Democrat politicians raised concerns about the investor-state dispute settlement process: ‘Including such provisions in the TPP could expose American taxpayers to billions of dollars in losses and dissuade the government from establishing or enforcing financial rules that impact foreign banks.’ Warren and her colleagues warned: ‘The consequence would be to strip our regulators of the tools they need to prevent the next crisis.’

Second, Senator Elizabeth Warren and her colleagues were concerned about including provisions in the TPP that would commit the American financial sector to ‘market access’ rules. She observed: ‘Such rules could be interpreted by international panels to prohibit basic, non-discriminatory restrictions on predatory or toxic financial products — such as particularly risky forms of derivatives — because those restrictions deny access to the U.S. financial markets.’ Warren and her colleagues observed: ‘To protect consumers and to address sources of systemic financial risk, Congress must maintain flexibility to impose restrictions on harmful financial products and on the conduct or structure of financial firms.’

Third, Warren and the other Democrat politicians were concerned about the inclusion of terms in the TPP that could limit the ability of the government to use capital controls: ‘If the TPP were to include provisions from past pacts that required unrestricted capital transfers, it could limit Congress’ prerogative to enact not only capital controls, but basic reform measures like a financial transactions tax.’

The group also requested that the United States Trade Representative provide Congressmen and women with ‘all U.S. proposals and bracketed negotiating texts relating to the three provisions.’ The group wanted transparency in respect of the TPP’s chapters on investment, financial services, and dispute settlement....

https://medium.com/@DrRimmer/senator-elizabeth-warren-fights-the-white-house-over-the-trans-pacific-partnership-tpp-3cd7bb0a1c91