Stop Fast Track

Floor Speech

STOP FAST TRACK -- (House of Representatives - February 16, 2007)

Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, for generations Hershey's chocolate has been an American symbol. Soldiers abroad distributed it to smiling children. Across our country people everywhere recognize the distinctive shape of Hershey kisses. Now Hershey's, too, is being outsourced to Mexico, as the great sucking sound of outsourced jobs accelerate in our country.

Yesterday, the Hershey Company announced it was moving 1,500 more manufacturing jobs to Mexico, terminating 1,500 U.S. workers and all the dairy farmers that supply work and product into that company.

Hershey now joins the ranks of Hoover, Stanley, Champion, Ford, Chrysler, Huffy, Zebco, Levi's and Maytag, who have shipped thousands more U.S. jobs to countries where workers toil for starvation wages.

Now President Bush wants to renew more of the same fast-track trade authority, to ship more of these jobs to Mexico and other trade rivals. He wants to sell our economy to the highest bidders in foreign countries.

NAFTA, CAFTA, PNTR and its cousin agreements have broken the middle class. Congress is long overdue to stand up for them. We must take back the authority to regulate commerce with foreign nations and start creating good jobs in our country again. It is time to stop fast track.

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