FAIR Takes Stand Against TPA

Date: Tuesday, June 03, 2003 12:39 PM

JOB DESTRUCTION NEWSLETTER

www.ZaZona.com

Just over a year ago I received a distress phone call from a government
insider in Washington D.C. The insider had some dire news about TPA. I
was told that TPA would be the final assault on the American middle
class. The insider hoped I could warn the public about what was
happening behind closed doors.

My first step was to publish a newsletter titled, "TPA is H-1B on
Steroids". For those of you that haven't heard, TPA stands for the
"Trade Promotion Authority" that was granted to Bush last year. TPA was
formerly called "fast-track authority". The name was changed because
marketing experts thought that TPA projects a more positive image. TPA
will allow for the free transfer of people across national boundaries,
forcing workers to bid against each other in a global labor auction.

I proceeded to contact reporters and newspapers to try to get attention
focused on what TPA means for American workers. I was totally ignored.
Not one single reporter answered my messages. Dr. Norman Matloff was
the only one that understood the importance of my findings. He followed
up with newsletters of his own on the subject. Unfortunately the issue
died. Our efforts to warn the public didn't raise an eyebrow.

In October of 2002 I brought up the subject of TPA at the FAIR Board of
Advisors Meeting at Arlington, VA. Some were skeptical but most of the
FAIR members took what I had to say very seriously. Dan Stein and I had
a short but intense discussion on what TPA is and what it means.
Stein's analysis of TPA on FAIR's new web page demonstrates that he
fully understands that TPA is everything the L-1 is - but worse.

I am pleased to see that FAIR is taking a stand against TPA. FAIR's
analysis is right on target that L-1 visas will become moot once enough
of these trade agreements are made. FAIR's statistics on L-1 visas are
probably too low because they directly contradict the far higher
numbers published by the INS/BCIS, but they reached the correct
conclusions anyway.

The globalists are way ahead of the American public. A TPA agreement
has been made with Singapore, and Chile is next. These agreements are
being formalized without public debate behind closed doors. Bush and
whoever is the next president will blindside the American public so
fast they won't know what hit them. Don't think a Democrat will be
better because Clinton tried and failed to get TPA.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Norm Matloff [mailto:matloff@laura.cs.ucdavis.edu]
> Sent: Monday, June 02, 2003 7:55 PM
> To: Norm Matloff
> Subject: Rob Sanchez told you so

Many of you will recall the issue of Trade Promotion Authority (TPA)
which came up in Congress last year. Basically, TPA gives the President
carte blanche for making trade treaties, which, one must keep in mind,
includes not only goods but also services, i.e. LABOR. If the
President signs a treaty, under TPA Congress would lose its line-item
veto of individual issues in the treaty. Congress would only be able
to vote up or down on the treaty as a whole, and since there would be
tons of pork for special interests, Congress would not dare vote down.

At the time Rob Sanchez warned that TPA could give rise to treaties
which made reform of H-1B/L-1 impossible, and maybe even liberalize
them. I followed suit, posting to this e-newsletter both Rob's concerns
and various documents about TPA.

I remember one journalist told me that she had brought up these
concerns with a pro-TPA lobbyist, and that the latter had replied, "Oh
come on, that's really a stretch." Well, folks, "T-h-e-y'r-e h-e-r-e!"

The first hit we're going to take under TPA has now occurred. You can

see all the details at:
http://www.fairus.org/html/07444306.htm but here's a summary:

On May 6 of this year, President Bush signed the Singapore Free Trade
Agreement. As an FTA, it is technically not a treaty and thus need not
be ratified by the Senate. If Congress did wish to get involved,
though, it would apparently have to vote down the entire FTA, which as
I said above is unlikely to happen.

Annex 11A, Section III (2) of the Singapore FTA agrees, for
intracompany
transfers (i.e. L-1):

A Party shall not:

(a) as a condition for temporary entry under paragraph 1,
require labor certification tests or other procedures of
similar effect; or

(b) impose or maintain any numerical restriction relating to
temporary entry under paragraph 1.

For example, imposing a prevailing-wage requirement would arguably
violate clause (a).

The U.S. is now in the process of setting up similar agreements with
some other nations.

Norm

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