July 08, 2016
A struggle over the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP) is taking place within the 187-member Democratic Party platform committee as they gather in Orlando to hammer out the details of the previously approved draft. As I wrote yesterday here, the fight has potential implications for the presidential race, because it is Hillary’s delegates who are trying to prevent the platform from having a position against the TPP. This could give Donald Trump more of an opening to argue that Hillary doesn’t really oppose the TPP, and potentially win over some swing voters for whom this is an important issue.
Meanwhile, a source who is familiar with the situation has stated that President Obama told Democratic Party Platform Committee Members that if the platform explicitly opposed the TPP, he would not “go all in” for Hillary’s campaign. This could explain part of Hillary’s reported “whip operation” to get her delegates to block the anti-TPP statement from the platform.
On the other hand, most press reports have attributed too much of the responsibility to Obama for this potential outcome, and for the actual outcome of the platform draft committee’s 10–5 vote on June 24, rejecting the anti-TPP language. (The five Sanders representatives voted in favor of the anti-TPP plank, and Bernie is continuing the fight, possibly to the convention floor if it fails again in Orlando). First of all, Hillary does not answer to Obama, and neither do her delegates — and many of them have more reason to care about pleasing the next president than the current one. Also, for the above reasons, Hillary could be taking more electoral risk by thwarting the will of the primary voters and the Party by keeping this out of the platform, than by annoying Obama by allowing it in. After all, it would be very unusual for him not to campaign for her; he does not want a President Trump any more than any other Democrat does; and the presidential race will also affect the outcome of Congressional elections.
There is also a lot of reporting that emphasizes how Democratic delegates, including members of Congress, don’t want to deny President Obama something that is important to his legacy. This is also something of an exaggeration. Most importantly, what kind of legacy is the TPP? Is Bill Clinton proud today of having rammed NAFTA through Congress, with a majority of Democratic Representatives voting against it? If he was, Hillary would be campaigning on it instead of running away from both that agreement and the TPP. And this latest agreement is pretty much guaranteed to be worse than NAFTA, given the number of countries and the rapid multiplication of lawsuits in recent years, by corporations seeking damages from governments under these agreements. If it passes, it will look much worse in the future than it does now, like George W. Bush’s legacy of the Iraq War. Better for those delegates who care about Obama’s legacy to protect it by blocking this agreement.
Finally, an interesting development this week: Senator Elizabeth Warren, a potential running mate for Hillary, released a powerful 5-minute video urging people to stop the TPP. The timing of this video, just before the current platform fight, is not coincidental. It is reminiscent of her famous New York Times op-ed just before the Iowa primary vote, which did not endorse Bernie, but was widely seen in political circles as boosting him with convincing arguments about the power of the chief executive to get things done in the face of an opposition Congress. Warren knows that the TPP and the issues it raises are going to be an important political battleground long after this presidential election, and she wants to be on the right side of history. Because she just might have a shot at being the next president after the one that is elected in November.
