U.S. Congress passes CAFTA with 2 vote House margin

Thursday, July 28, 2005

The U.S. House of Representatives approved the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) early morning Thursday, with a narrow vote of 217 in favor, 215 against. Voting was held open for an hour, 45 minutes past the House's 15-minute voting rule as the President along with other supporters lobbied into the night.

The vote was so close, if one House member changed a "Yea" vote to a "Nay" vote, CAFTA would have failed in a 216-216 tie.

Republican vote breakdown

In tallying the votes, 25 Republicans, mostly from Midwest Corn Belt and Rust Belt states and the Southeast United States's textile industrial belt, broke party line to vote against the measure. Two Republicans were present, but refused to vote.

Democrat and Independent vote breakdown

The Democrats presented a more united front. All but 15 Democrats present voted against the treaty. Independent House members, who usually vote with the Democrats also voted against the measure.

Supporters of the measure include President George W. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, U.S. Trade Representative Rob Portman and Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez. Opponents included most House Democrats.

The trade agreement already passed the Senate in June. President Bush has said he will sign it into law.

Provisions

DR-CAFTA encompasses the following components:

Services: all public services are to be open to private investment.
Investment: governments promise to grant ironclad guarantees to foreign investment.
Government procurement: All government purchases must be open to transnational bids.
Market access: governments pledge to reduce and eventually to eliminate tariffs and other measures that protect domestic products.
Agriculture: duty-free import and elimination of subsidies on agricultural products.
Intellectual property rights: privatization of and monopoly over technological know-how.
Anti-dumping rules, subsidies and countervailing rights: governments commit to phase out protectionist barriers in all sectors.
Competition policy: the dismantling of national monopolies.
Dispute resolution: the right of transnationals to sue countries in private international courts.
Environmental protection: the enforcement of environmental laws and improvement of the environment.
Labor standards: the enforcement of the International Labour Organization's core labor standards.
Transparency: the reduction of government corruption.
Test-Data Exclusivity for pharmaceutical corporations

Related news

"CAFTA faces tough vote in U.S. House" — Wikinews, July 27, 2005

Sources

Wikipedia

Wikipedia has more about this subject:

Central American Free Trade Agreement

Jim Abrams. "In Bush win, House narrowly approves CAFTA" — Associated Press, July 28, 2005
"House narrowly approves CAFTA" — CNN, July 28, 2005

External links

Share this:

This page is archived, and is no longer publicly editable.

Articles presented on Wikinews reflect the specific time at which they were written and published, and do not attempt to encompass events or knowledge which occur or become known after their publication.

Got a correction? Add the template {{editprotected}} to the talk page along with your corrections, and it will be brought to the attention of the administrators.

Please note that due to our archival policy, we will not alter or update the content of articles that are archived, but will only accept requests to make grammatical and formatting corrections.

Note that some listed sources or external links may no longer be available online due to age.

The text of this article has been released into the public domain. In the event that this is not legally possible, this article may be used for any purpose, without any condition, unless such conditions are required by law. This applies worldwide. Copyright terms on images, however, may vary, so please check individual image pages prior to duplication.