Click here to download a PDF version of this Action Call.
Tell your Representative that Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) needs to be renewed now
Workers whose jobs were destroyed by offshoring have been left in the cold for two years. They've been denied the job retraining and other benefits available for trade-displaced workers for decades — all because Congress has failed to act.
Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) provides up to two years of robust job training benefits for workers who lose their jobs to dumped and subsidized goods, changes in tariffs, and bad trade agreements. These impacts happen constantly as companies outsource and imported goods undermine domestic jobs.
Just over 84,000 workers are waiting for Congress to renew the TAA program. They have submitted petitions to the Department of Labor (DOL). Still, because Congress has not reauthorized TAA, the DOL cannot make determinations on these worker layoffs.
Congress now has an opportunity to help these workers.
Here's what's happening. - The House Ways and Means Committee is responsible for trade and tax issues. Our union has learned that this Committee is considering "marking up" a Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) bill. This bill would cut tariffs for many goods, including gold chains and luxury goods like high-end purses.
These tariff cuts would be awarded to importers who source from countries with terrible labor and environmental rights. The bill would also cut tariffs on imports that impact our members' jobs - like the tires thousands of USW members across the country build.
Here's our opportunity. - The Committee can add or subtract provisions by marking up a bill. The USW has asked this Committee to also renew TAA in any trade bill that cuts tariffs and not to cut duties on the goods our members make. Some in Congress want to renew GSP without renewing TAA and give back to importers the $1.47 billion in tariffs collected over the last couple of years since the program expired.
The Time to Speak Up is Now!
Click HERE to send a prewritten email to your Representative.
You can also call them using our direct connect number.
U.S. House: 1-866-202-5409
Tell them who you are, where you are from, and to let them know we want the Ways and Means Committee to renew TAA. Giving over a billion dollars to importers, while telling the American worker who lost their job to bad trade policy that Congress cannot help them is unacceptable.
Please take action today!