Breaking through the messy trade debate: An explainer

U.S. President Barack Obama departs after meeting with Democratic House members at the U.S. Capitol. (Photo: Jonathan Ernst/Reuters)

With his presidency getting closer to lame-duck territory, President Barack Obama is trying to score what could be one of the last major policy wins of his administration: a sweeping trade agreement between North American nations and a group of powerful, growing Asian and Pacific countries. The only problem? House Democrats are blocking his way.

There are real ramifications to what happens with the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which the administration argues will spur American economic growth through a boost in exports and detractors say could cost millions of American jobs. And so far Congress has been divided on moving forward to make the still under-negotiation trade deal possible, with the Senate approving a pair of trade bills last month and the House blocking them last week.

As Congress continues to debate the issue, and the White House continues to claim that the present impasse is a mere “procedural snafu,” Yahoo News breaks down what’s what and takes a look at what’s next in the debate over the looming trade deal.

WHAT’S AT STAKE

There are three different initiatives making up the trade puzzle now under debate. Understanding what’s behind this alphabet soup is critical to understanding what went down in Washington over the past few days.

First up is the fate of something called Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA). In its current form, it was first approved by Congress and implemented in 1974 to provide laborers and farmers displaced by international trade deals with income support, job training and job-search assistance. Depending on the government’s determination of a displaced laborer’s ability to find new work, it entitles displaced workers to various and simultaneous stipends and allowances, including for relocation and health care. The program, run by multiple government agencies including the Departments of Labor and Agriculture, needs to be reapproved by Congress every so often in order to continue.

Democrats have been strong backers of the program in the past, but many Republicans oppose the program because of its costs, and because they say there’s little evidence it actually works.

Pending legislation would reauthorize the program until 2021. But last week Democrats voted down the program, even though they support it, because Republicans have bundled it with another program they oppose.

Ships gather off the ports of L.A. and Long Beach, Calif., during a suspension of cargo loading and unloading earlier this year. (Photo: Bob Riha, Jr./Reuters)

That program, Trade Promotion Authority (TPA), is also called fast-track trade authority. It allows an administration to negotiate a trade deal with foreign nations without Congress being able to change it after the fact. The president lacks this fast-track authority unless Congress grants it to him, but historically Congress has given the president that power. Times have changed, though, and Democrats now strongly object to ceding this power because they believe previous trade deals they had no way to alter wound up imperiling American workers. The North American Free Trade Agreement of 1994, for example, caused an estimated 700,000 U.S. jobs to be lost.

Congress still gets to approve or reject trade deals even with TPA — it just can’t tweak them. But it can be hard to ever arrive at a deal without TPA, as the U.S. Trade Representative’s (USTR) office can’t guarantee other nations that what it’s offering or agreeing to won’t later be overturned by Congress.

And this brings us to the final piece of the puzzle, the big as-yet-not-final trade deal looming over the debate.

The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is a trade agreement that’s actively being negotiated by the USTR with approximately a dozen countries spanning the Pacific, from the U.S., Canada and Mexico to Australia, Malaysia and Singapore. Details of the agreement have been kept under wraps, and House Democrats have complained that their questions about the emerging deal have gone unanswered by White House and USTR officials.

The TPP could still move forward without TAA or TPA, but the administration would like as much freedom as possible to work out a trade deal without Congress trying to change it. That’s because the delicate coalition of moderate Republicans and moderate Democrats willing to back the TPP deal could fall apart if the trade bill were to get substantially altered during the process of Congress trying to approve it.

WHAT HAPPENED LAST WEEK

Let’s take this day by day.

President Barack Obama and Rep. Dan Kildee, D-Mich., wave to the crowd during the 54th Congressional Baseball Game. (Photo: Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call/Getty Images)

Thursday: With votes on TPA and TAA renewal looming, Obama made a surprise visit to Nationals Park, homebrewed White House beer in hand, to personally lobby Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi and fellow Democrats at the annual Congressional baseball game. As the president appeared before a stadium literally divided by party and baseline, staffers (many intoxicated) start chanting, “TPA! TPA!” The chants largely came from the GOP side, and the visit seemed to do little more than provide cute photo-ops with giant, racing former presidents.

Earlier in the day, top White House officials also tried to sway House Democrats to their side in a closed-door caucus meeting, but according to sources familiar with the talk, the meeting was not productive and did not move votes.

Friday: Obama showed up at the Capitol to personally meet with Democrats for the second time in a span of about 12 hours. He spoke to them for 45 minutes, took no questions and told them they were on the wrong side of the debate, according to Democratic sources familiar with the session. Hours later Congress started putting the different programs to a vote, starting with TAA. It failed 126-302, thanks to Democratic and Republican opposition.

Republican leaders originally had planned to cancel a vote on TPA in the event of TAA’s failure — again, the bills are linked procedurally, so the failure of TAA means the failure of TPA — but decided to hold a symbolic vote anyway on TPA anyway. It passed with the slimmest of margins, with 219 in favor. (A bill requires 218 votes to pass the House.)

Pelosi said in a letter to fellow Democrats she would like to see Congress approve a long-term transportation infrastructure bill before moving again on trade.

The White House press secretary repeatedly called the vote against TAA a “procedural snafu” but did not offer next steps.

Members of the House depart for the weekend after a series of critical votes at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. (Photo: Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

Monday: With no signs of either side budging, House Republicans called an emergency Rules Committee meeting to extend the calendar for consideration of the trade bills until July 30. Originally the bills were supposed to be handled last week so that Congress could move on to other matters. The Rules Committee approved the extension and sent it to the full House for consideration.

Tuesday: The House approved the extension, giving leaders more time to negotiate a way forward, and the White House decided it would send top advisers to meet with pro-trade Democrats. Meanwhile, Republican leaders focused on the fact that the TAA vote exposed rifts in the Democratic Party and argued that ultimately Obama would have to resolve the Democrats’ intraparty issues before a new vote could be held. For their part, Democrats opposed to the trade deal remain skeptical that the White House can offer any substantive changes that would allay their concerns. And the administration focused only on meeting with the small group of Democratic trade supporters in trying to find a solution, further irking the majority of Democratic members who have concerns.

WHAT HAPPENS NOW

Pro-trade Democrats and anti-trade Democrats have been dug in on their positions for years, and the White House has shown no public indication that it would like to reach out to Democratic opponents of TPA or that it needs to secure their support to move forward.

But with the extension of time to act on TAA and TPA until the end of July, lawmakers have more time to work out a new deal.