Bush sends Colombia trade pact to Congress

President Bush on Monday moved to force Congress to vote on a free trade agreement (FTA) with Colombia, setting up a huge partisan fight on Capitol Hill.

“The need for this agreement is too urgent, the stakes for our national security are too high to allow this year to end without a vote,” Bush said. In addition to national security, the agreement “will strengthen a courageous ally in our hemisphere. It will help America’s economy and America’s workers at a vital time.”

{mosads}Democrats have criticized the agreement because of the murders of labor organizers in Colombia, and labor unions are solidly opposed to the deal.

Bush, however, said that the pact includes “the strongest labor and environmental provisions of any free trade agreement in history.”

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said the president’s decision to force a vote on the trade pact “maximize[s] the chances it will fail,” adding that it is “one more mistake to his legacy and one more mess for the next president to clean up.

“There is strong support for Colombia in the U.S. Congress, evidenced by the fact that Colombia is the largest recipient of U.S. aid money in the hemisphere,” Reid said. “Many in Congress have tremendous respect for the progress that President [Alvaro] Uribe has been able to make under difficult circumstances. It is a major mistake, however, to set up the Colombia FTA legislation as the proxy for support for Colombia, as the Bush administration is trying to do.”

Reid argued that a trade pact “is not a foreign-aid package,” noting that “many Democrats continue to have serious concerns about an agreement that creates the highest level of economic integration with a country where workers and their families are routinely murdered and subjected to violence and intimidation for seeking to exercise their most basic economic rights.”

Bush signed the deal last summer before the so-called fast-track law for trade deals expired. Under fast-track, Congress cannot amend trade agreements. Fast-track also gives Congress a time limit of 90 legislative days to vote on the deal. Bush said he was sending the deal to Congress on Monday to ensure a vote this year within that time frame.

Some observers, however, have said Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) could use the House Rules Committee to bottle up the legislation.