"Economic Choices '08" - Iowa's Take on Free Trade
Wednesday, November 07, 2007SUSIE GHARIB: The House of Representatives is moving tonight towards passage of a trade agreement with Peru. The Bush administration says the deal will reduce tariffs and boost exports for U.S. companies. Critics say it will cost U.S. jobs. If those arguments sound familiar, it's because they were also made about the North American Free Trade Agreement 14 years ago. Tonight as we continue our "Economic Choices '08" coverage, Darren Gersh looks at why NAFTA is an issue in the upcoming Iowa caucuses.
DARREN GERSH, NIGHTLY BUSINESS REPORT CORRESPONDENT: Load by load, they are scrapping more than a century of tradition in Newton, Iowa. This was Maytag's town and for 21 years this is where Ted Johnson worked. The assembly lines shut down late last month. Now the equipment is being shipped away. The only reminder of the thousands of people who once worked here is this monument left by the last shift. As local union president, Johnson represented those workers. He says Maytag's bad management undermined the company, but he also lays part of the blame on NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Agreement. Johnson believes the free trade deal with Mexico and Canada increased competition and put more pressure on Maytag and other manufacturers.
TED JOHNSON, PRESIDENT, UAW LOCAL 997: Foreign competition was not even a problem. When I started, I mean it was the last thing. I mean, before NAFTA, nobody ever even thought about it.
GERSH: NAFTA has become an unlikely issue as Iowa prepares for its presidential caucuses. To some voters, the trade deal is a potent symbol of what's gone wrong with our nation's economic policies. NAFTA also blurs traditional ideological lines. On the left, advocates for immigrants believe NAFTA has allowed subsidized U.S. corn to flood the Mexican market, forcing poor farmers there off the land. The result has been a surge of illegal immigrants into states like Iowa. A member of the Immigrants Voice Project in Des Moines, Ann Naffier says she's looking for a presidential candidate who understands the connection between NAFTA and immigration reform.
ANN NAFFIER, IMMIGRANTS VOICE PROJECT, AMERICAN FRIENDS SERVICE COMMITTEE: And I have not heard many presidential candidates talk about it from that point of view of what we as the United States, the most powerful country in the world, what we need to do with our own foreign policy and our economic policy to assure that people aren't forced to leave their country.
GERSH: On the right, Robert Ussery agrees NAFTA is forcing illegal immigrants to come to Iowa, though he disagrees with Naffier on the solution. As Des Moines chapter leader of the Iowa Minutemen, Ussery has little patience for the free trade rhetoric of the leading Republican candidates. He fears NAFTA is eroding U.S. sovereignty and enriching corporations at the expense of working families.
ROBERT USSERY, DES MOINES CHAPTER LEADER, IOWA MINUTEMEN: All those factories have gone south of the border. And now those manufacturing jobs are replaced by a service economy, minimum wage, no insurance, part time. And I don't want that kind of future for my daughter.
GERSH: On the Democratic side, candidates Barack Obama and John Edwards have pledged to renegotiate NAFTA, but Hillary Clinton seems to stop short, promising to review the trade deal. That's not enough for Ted Johnson.
JOHNSON: They should have reviewed it before it got signed and perhaps they should have listened to some folks who said "hey, this is not a good deal."
GERSH: Not far from the Maytag plant, farmer Bob Talsma is rushing to bring in the harvest. He says he's sympathetic to the pain caused by the Maytag shutdown.
BILL TALSMA, OWNER, I-80 FARMS: The Newton plant is a bad deal. My wife worked there, so it's tough for me and I have lots of friends, everybody around here worked at Maytag.
GERSH: But Canada and Mexico are Iowa's two largest trading partners. And like many in this agricultural state, Talsma considers exports vital.
TALSMA: Mexico is a huge customer of ours. So, we're all for free trade. So I guess I'm for NAFTA. I think all farmers are.
GERSH: Almost 14 years after it took effect, NAFTA remains a divisive issue in the presidential caucuses. The trade deal is creating opportunities for some while eroding the security voters like Ted Johnson once took for granted.
JOHNSON: Right now in Newton, you're going to have to drive to look for a job and don't ask me which direction to drive, because I myself am going to be looking for a job.
GERSH: Darren Gersh, NIGHTLY BUSINESS REPORT, Newton, Iowa.
