[国会记录第161卷，第79号(2015年5月21日星期四)][众议院][页码H3550-H3555[英语泛读材料国会在贸易政策中的角色临时议长。根据众议院议长2015年1月6日宣布的政策，这位来自密歇根州的先生(莱文先生)被确认为少数党领袖的指定人选，时间为60分钟。莱文先生。议长先生，距离上一次关于贸易促进权的辩论已经过去12年了，上一次我们考虑国会在贸易谈判中的角色。自那以后发生了很多变化:世界变了;贸易谈判已经改变;国会在贸易谈判中的角色也发生了变化。[．..]There are several other TPP issues that need to be addressed. Food safety is one of them. There is a very broad consensus that not enough resources are being devoted to ensure the safety of our imports. What are we going to do about this issue? It is a real issue in the debate. Unfortunately, specific portions of the negotiations and the shortcomings in TPP are often difficult to discuss because the documents are classified. I have not argued that the entire negotiations should be open to the public. I understand that, in a wide range of contexts, from peace negotiations to labor negotiations, it is widely assumed that negotiations at times need to be held behind closed doors, and at this point, I am not convinced that trade negotiations are different. The negotiators need to communicate frequently and effectively with stakeholders to ensure that they are seeking the right provisions in negotiations. In a number of respects, our negotiators were not doing that when the TPP negotiations were in the early or even not so early stages. Thanks to constant pressure from Members of Congress over the past several years, we have made some progress in this regard. For example, just a couple of years ago, USTR refused to share the bracketed text-- laying out the positions of various parties--with any Member of Congress. We got them to change that. Much more recently, they refused to let staff from personal offices assist their Members with the text even where the staff member had a top secret security clearance. We got them to change that. Still, there remain unreasonable and burdensome restrictions on access to the text. For example, Congress created a system of stakeholder advisers many years ago to provide advice to our negotiators and to Congress on the negotiations, but those advisers still can only see U.S. negotiating proposals. They cannot see the proposals of our trading partners. It is very difficult, if not impossible, for them to provide negotiating advice if they can't know what the other side is seeking. Moreover, personal office staff with top secret security clearances still cannot see the negotiating text until the Member is present. Let me say a few more words about this. I am not at all confident that our negotiators are sharing with Members of Congress or the stakeholder advisers all of the texts that are being exchanged with other TPP countries. For example, we know our negotiators, as I have said, have been discussing a labor consistency plan with Vietnam for many months now at least, but there is still no text for Members of Congress to review. This is one of the major outstanding issues in TPP, and yet there is no text to review despite the fact that USTR has told us for at least a year now that the negotiations were nearly complete. At a recent meeting to discuss Vietnam, it was classified so that the status of negotiations on this issue cannot be discussed publicly. Many of us left less confident that there has been any progress in the negotiations. Or take currency manipulation. For years, literally, we have pressed what the administration's position is on the issue given that majorities in both the House and the Senate have urged that strong and enforceable currency disciplines be included in TPP. For years, the administration said it was still deliberating on the issue and had no answer. Now, when pushed through the TPA debate in Congress, the administration claims that they could not possibly include enforceable disciplines in TPP because they would be a poison pill. Finally, I do not understand why the administration is selectively able to reveal to the public certain aspects that they think the public will like, but those of us who have concerns cannot reveal them. We have examples of officials revealing to the press very specific things from the negotiating text, like when tariffs will be eliminated on a particular product. In my view, as to the Environment Chapter, the problem with that chapter is that many of the verbs used in those obligations--the essence of the commitments--are very weak, but I, presumably, can't tell you what those verbs are. So one has a hard time understanding the rationale for this process. The way it has been handled by the administration does not make Members and other key parties real participants with a meaningful role, understanding and impacting decisions undertaken in this important negotiation. [...]