Senate Finance Committe Votes to Recommend CAFTA
June 29, 2005
From earlier this morning:
The Senate Finance Committee completed its markup on CAFTA about half an hour ago. Bingaman announced in the beginning that he would be voting for CAFTA. He received a letter from USTR with commitments on funding and monitoring of enforcement of labor standards, and funding for assistance to subsistence farmers displaced as a result of CAFTA. The letter will be part of the Committee record and will probably be posted on the Senate Finance web site soon. Kyl and Lincoln also made statements in favor. There were also a couple of long exchanges, involving comments by Grassley and Baucus, primarily in response to Bingaman's statement, about the need for Congress to address the problem and the root causes of the trade deficit.
In the end, Grassley called for a voice vote and CAFTA was passed. Baucus registered his objection to the voice vote but did not insist on a roll call because he knew that Grassley had the votes to pass it with Bingaman, even if Thomas were to vote against. Clearly, calling a voice vote was the way to avoid forcing Thomas and Crapo to register their votes, since no sugar deal has been reached. Thomas and Crapo were not in the room when the actual vote took place. In fact, there seemed to be only one lone voice heard against (Baucus), even though Schumer and Snowe were also there. That is not to imply that the previous no votes may have changed, but just to say that the vote process itself seemed to be a bit of a farce.
Notes from Stephanie Weinberg, Trade Policy Advisor, Oxfam America