Rep. Andy Levin Statement on USMCA

Statement

Congressman Andy Levin, vice chair of the House Education and Labor Committee, today released the following statement:

I look forward to diving into the details of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) agreement before making a final judgment about it. And I deeply appreciate and respect the work of the Speaker, Chairman Neal, the Speaker's working group, and our allies who helped make it way more worker and consumer friendly than what the President proposed.

However, I have been in the fight for workers' rights in the U.S. and abroad for 35 years - in SEIU, the UAW, the AFL-CIO, the Clinton Administration and beyond. This is the core of my expertise and life experience.

Based on my discussions about the negotiations and the reality on the ground in Mexico, I fear that this NAFTA 2.0 will not provide Mexican workers with the freedom to organize independent unions and bargain for a better life on any scale - and in the export sectors that matter most to U.S. workers in particular. Only ending the deeply entrenched company union/protection contract system will raise standards for Mexican workers so we can slow the stream of American middle class jobs being transformed into low wage jobs south of the border. If the new agreement fails to accomplish that, we will spawn another generation of justifiably alienated U.S. workers. I will not stand for that.

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