BILL ANALYSIS
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|SENATE RULES COMMITTEE | AJR 27|
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THIRD READING
Bill No: AJR 27
Author: Torrico (D), et al
Amended: 5/3/10 in Assembly
Vote: 21
SENATE BUS., PROF. & ECON. DEV. COMMITTEE : 5-2, 8/9/10
AYES: Negrete McLeod, Corbett, Correa, Florez, Yee
NOES: Wyland, Aanestad
NO VOTE RECORDED: Calderon, Walters
ASSEMBLY FLOOR : 47-27, 6/21/10 - See last page for vote
SUBJECT : Colombia-United States free trade agreement
SOURCE : California Labor Federation
DIGEST : This resolution memorializes Congress that the
California Legislature opposes the United States-Colombia
Trade Promotion Agreement.
ANALYSIS :
Existing law :
1. The United States Constitution gives the federal
government the power to enter into trade agreements.
Federal law requires Congress to approve international
agreements.
2. Specifies that the Governor is the primary state officer
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representing California's interest in international
affairs.
3. Specifies the Business, Transportation and Housing
Agency (BT&H) as the primary state agency authorized to
attract foreign investments, cooperate in international
public infrastructure projects, and support California
businesses, not otherwise assisted by Department of Food
and Agriculture (DFA), in accessing markets, and
requires the Secretary of BT&H to develop an
international trade and investment policy.
4. Specifies that the State's Single Point of Contact
(SPOC), within the executive branch, acts, in compliance
with federal practice, as the liaison between the state
and the Office of the United States Trade Representative
(USTR) on trade-related matters.
5. Clarifies that the SPOC is often provided the
opportunity to review and comment on ongoing trade
negotiations and requires the SPOC, in addition to other
duties assigned by the Governor, to do all of the
following:
A. Promptly disseminate information from the USTR
to the appropriate state agencies, departments, and
legislative committees.
B. Work with the Legislature and appropriate state
agencies to review the effects of any proposed or
enacted trade agreement provisions on California
environment, businesses, workers, and general
lawmaking authority and to communicate those
findings to the USTR.
C. Serve as the liaison to the Legislature on
matters of trade policy oversight.
6. Requires the Office of Planning and Research (OPR) to
maintain and update, a full and comprehensive list of
all state agreements made with foreign governments,
updated within 30 days of the effective date of each new
agreement.
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This bill declares that:
1. Violence against trade unionists persists to this day,
with over 500 unionists having been murdered during the
administration of Colombian President Alvaro Uribe.
2. The Office of the Attorney General of Colombia has
secured convictions in only about five percent of the
over 2,700 cases of murder of trade unionists, and in
the vast majority of cases, the person convicted of the
crime is not the originator of the crime, but rather
carried out the order to kill.
3. Defamatory remarks regarding trade unionists and human
rights defenders in Colombia delegitimize the important
and valued work of human rights defenders and place
individuals and entire organizations at the grave risk
of physical retaliation.
4. According to a 2008 Human Rights Watch report, numerous
politicians, including members of the Colombian
Congress, have come under criminal investigation for
collaborating with paramilitaries; the groups
responsible for the majority of crimes against trade
unionists.
5. According to Human Rights Watch, there is overwhelming
evidence of broad, systematic, and illegal surveillance
conducted by the government of Colombia against hundreds
of members of human rights organizations, political
opposition parties and unions, as well as journalists,
and even clergy.
6. The United Nations Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial
Executions, Phillip Alston, recently found that killings
of innocent civilians by the armed forces have occurred
throughout the country.
7. According to the International Labor Organization, the
labor laws of Colombia fall short of minimum
international labor standards.
Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (U.S.T.R) . Created
in 1962 by Executive Order as an agency within the
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Executive Office of the President, the USTR negotiates
directly with foreign governments on internal trade
agreements. The USTR consults states on provisions of a
trade agreement through: direct consultation with a state
Governor; a state SPOC and Intergovernmental Policy
Advisory Committee (IGPAC). Currently, when a trade
agreement is under negotiation, the USTR sends all
correspondence and requests to Governors. If a Governor
agrees to bind the state or state agency to the provisions
or a procurement agreement, the USTR includes the state or
state agency as a bound party in the appendix to the
specific trade agreement. Past California governors have
bound the state to the terms of specific government
procurement provisions via the USTR directly.
U.S. Trade Agreements . The U.S. Constitution grants the
federal government the power to enter into treaties and
trade agreements. The power, however, is vested in the
U.S. Congress to ratify trade agreements with a two-thirds
vote of approval. Throughout the trade agreement
negotiation process, the U.S. has potential to influence
policy reforms, using a relationship with the U.S. as
leverage and incentive to bring about potential and
positive change.
The U.S. has trade agreements in force with 17 countries
including Australia, Bahrain, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica,
Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras,
Israel, Jordan, Mexico, Morocco, Nicaragua, Oman, Peru, and
Singapore. Congressional approval has not been provided
for trade agreements with Colombia, Korea, and Panama.
Canada has also negotiated, but not ratified, a trade
agreement with Colombia.
Besides trade agreements, the U.S. has a number of trade
preference programs that allow special access to U.S.
markets for countries that are considered developing
markets and/or where the U.S. wants to develop a stronger
relationship. Colombia currently has access to U.S.
markets through the nation's general preference provisions
and the Andean Trade Preference Act (ATPA). The ATPA
(enacted in 1991) is designed to assist Bolivia, Colombia,
Ecuador, and Peru in their fight against drug production
and trafficking by expanding their economic alternatives.
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In addition to trade support, the U.S. funds Plan Colombia,
a multi-year initiative to reduce drug trafficking and
promote development. According to the Congressional
Research Bureau, more than $7 billion has been provided to
Colombia (2000 to 2009) pursuant to this initiative.
The Columbia Agreement . According to the USTR, the
Colombia Agreement was signed on November 22, 2006. When
the Agreement takes effect, Colombia will immediately
eliminate most of its tariffs on U.S. exports, with all
remaining tariffs phased out over defined time periods.
The Colombia Agreement also includes standards relating to
customs administration and trade facilitation, technical
barriers to trade, government procurement, investment,
telecommunications, electronic commerce, intellectual
property rights, and labor and environmental protection.
The USTR states that U.S. firms will have better access to
Colombia's services sector than other WTO Members have
under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade.
Colombia's Congress approved the Agreement and a protocol
of amendment in 2007. Colombia's Constitutional Court
completed its review in July 2008, and concluded that the
Agreement conforms to Colombia's Constitution. President
Obama tasked the USTR with seeking a path to address
outstanding issues surrounding the Agreement.
Human Rights Violations in Columbia . The United Nations'
Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR)
has had an official presence in Colombia since 1997. The
Colombia OHCHR office plays a number of roles, including
serving as an observer and reporter on human rights and
international humanitarian law violations. In addition to
the country level-efforts of the OHCHR, the Human Rights
Council of the General Assembly of the United Nations has
sent representatives to Colombia to assess conditions.
Most recently, the Special Rapporteur on the situation of
human rights defenders, i.e. people who advocate for human
rights, released a summary report on her September 2009
onsite review. During the trip, she met with senior
government officials, human rights defenders and people in
the communities. In her findings, she acknowledges that
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Colombia has made significant progress in improving the
overall security of the country between 2002, when
President Uribe took office, and 2008, including having a
measurable decrease in the number of homicides. She also
states, however, that she is deeply concerned about the
widespread phenomenon of threats being made against human
rights defenders (including unionists) and their families,
often through pamphlets, obituaries, emails, phone calls
and text messages. She states that she received numerous
accounts of threats in all places she visited in the
country. This phenomenon has reportedly worsened since the
beginning of 2009 and this fact was corroborated to her by
the Head of the National Police.
The report specially addresses the plight of trade
unionists and the increased threats and especially the
continued practice of "enforced disappearance and
execution." Also included in the report are concerns
raised about the treatment of indigenous leaders;
Afro-Colombian leaders; activists for displaced persons;
women human rights defenders; journalists; youth activists;
church workers; lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender; and
magistrates.
Her recommendation to the international community is that
it should continue monitoring the situation of human rights
defenders, in particular the most targeted and vulnerable
ones, and to express support for the work of the human
rights defenders, among other venues, before international
and regional human rights compliance mechanisms.
Colombia's Workers . International labor leaders and those
in the U.S. and California have repeatedly raised concerns
that the Colombian government does not have sufficient
laws, nor does it systematically enforce the laws it does
have, in order to protect the rights and lives of trade
unionists.
In addition to the 48 trade unionists murdered in 2009, 29
trade unionists have been murdered in 2010. Labor leaders
have stated that the Colombian government has been
extremely slow to arrest and bring to trial the people who
were responsible for the more than 2,700 murders of
Colombian trade unionists since 1986. Many of those that
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have been tried have been tried in abstentia, resulting in
no real justice for those who have suffered at their hands.
FISCAL EFFECT : Fiscal Com.: No
SUPPORT : (Verified 8/9/10)
California Labor Federation (source)
American Federation State, County, Municipal Employees,
AFL-CIO
California Conference Board of the Amalgamated Transit
Union
California Conference of Machinists
California Federation of Teachers
California Nurses Association
California Teamsters Public Affairs Council
Central Labor Council, AFL-CIO, of San Bernardino and
Riverside Counties
Engineers and Scientists of California
International Longshore & Warehouse Union - AFL-CIO
National Lawyers Guild, Labor & Employment Committee
National Nurses Organizing Committee
North Bay Labor Council - AFL-CIO
Northern California District Council of the International
Longshore and Warehouse Union
Professional & Technical Engineers, Local 21
San Diego-Imperial Counties Labor Council AFL-CIO
San Joaquin Calaveras Central Labor Council
StanislaU.S. and Tuolomne Counties Central Labor Council
AFL-CIO
UNITE HERE!
United Food and Commercial Workers Union, Western States
Council
OPPOSITION : (Verified 8/9/10)
California Chamber of Commerce
California Farm Bureau Federation
Embassy of Colombia in Washington D.C.
Gathers Strategies
Palm Desert Chamber of Commerce
U.S.S-POSCO Industries
W.J. Byrnes and Co.
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ARGUMENTS IN SUPPORT : Supporters argue that trade
agreements can provide great economic benefits to all
impacted nations, or "they can create a race to the bottom,
increasing unemployment and lowering wages for all workers.
For an international trade agreement to generate real
economic development, it must be premised upon enforceable
labor standards." Supporters also note that free trade
agreements can work when good paying jobs and enforceable
standards are in place.
ARGUMENTS IN OPPOSITION : Opponents believe that current
tariffs prohibit successful trading in the Colombian market
and elimination of duties will create new opportunities for
California exporters. Opponents also note that this
resolution is not legally binding and would cast Colombia,
an important trading partner, in an unproductive light and
believe that the Colombia Agreement is "a critical element
of the U.S. strategy to liberalize trade through
multilateral, regional and bilateral initiatives." They
additionally cite the rapid growth of exports to Colombia
by small and medium sized U.S. firms.
ASSEMBLY FLOOR :
AYES: Ammiano, Arambula, Bass, Beall, Block, Blumenfield,
Bradford, Brownley, Buchanan, Charles Calderon, Carter,
Chesbro, Coto, Davis, De La Torre, De Leon, Eng, Evans,
Feuer, Fong, Fuentes, Furutani, Gatto, Hall, Hayashi,
Hernandez, Hill, Huber, Huffman, Lieu, Bonnie Lowenthal,
Ma, Mendoza, Monning, Nava, V. Manuel Perez, Portantino,
Ruskin, Salas, Saldana, Solorio, Swanson, Torlakson,
Torres, Torrico, Yamada, John A. Perez
NOES: Adams, Anderson, Bill Berryhill, Tom Berryhill,
Conway, Cook, DeVore, Fletcher, Fuller, Gaines, Garrick,
Gilmore, Hagman, Harkey, Jeffries, Knight, Logue, Miller,
Nestande, Niello, Nielsen, Norby, Silva, Smyth, Audra
Strickland, Tran, Villines
NO VOTE RECORDED: Blakeslee, Caballero, Galgiani, Jones,
Skinner, Vacancy
JJA:do 8/10/10 Senate Floor Analyses
SUPPORT/OPPOSITION: SEE ABOVE
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