Here & Now

We don't want to send our jobs overseas with trade deals that are bad such as the TPP. I opposed the TPP, the Trans-Pacific Partnership, just like I opposed NAFTA. I've done this against democratic presidents like Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, as well as republicans. So I'm not a partisan on this issue. I'm independent. And to me Wisconsin jobs come first. We've lost 75,000 Wisconsin manufacturing jobs from these trade deals and Senator Johnson is hiding on this. You know he's voted for all these trade deals and voted for Fast Track. And all of a sudden he's saying, "Well, it's complicated, so I'm not going to tell you how I'm going to vote until after the election." Well, I think the people of this state deserve to know who is with the working families of this state. So it's another clear example of how we're different. What about opening up Wisconsin export markets though as part of any of these trade deals? Well that should be part of it of course. That would be the good news of a trade deal that made sense. But that's not the primary aspect of what happens here. What happens is our large employers here are tempted to move overseas because of lower wages. They don't have to follow the workers' rights provisions. They don't have to follow environmental provisions. And multi-national corporations can sue the United States and the state of Wisconsin to basically force us to get rid of things like food safety laws and Buy America laws. So there's no reason why you can't have a fair deal that actually promotes exports without selling our jobs down the river. But TPP isn't? Oh, TPP is a horrible corporate handshake. These things aren't negotiated by the people of different countries to their governments. They're negotiated by corporate representatives. And Senator Johnson is all in on that. He actually has said that this is just a wash for Wisconsin. No, it's not. 75,000 jobs lost according to official government certification is not a wash. It's a tragedy for many Wisconsin families.