News From USWA: March to Miami Launched by Broad Coalition Planning to Protest FTAA Ministerial in November.

Business Editors

WASHINGTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 25, 2003

News from USWA: Asserting that the forces opposed to the expansion of NAFTA to the entire hemisphere "are growing increasingly resistant to trade policies that foster exploitation," AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Richard Trumka today announced the launch of a nationwide March to Miami that will culminate in a massive protest at the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) ministerial scheduled for November.

"Tens of thousands of workers, environmentalists, human rights activists, advocates for the farming community and members of the faith community will gather in Miami to challenge the expansion of NAFTA," Trumka said in announcing a March to Miami being organized by the Alliance for Sustainable Jobs and the Environment (ASJE). The launch of the march is scheduled for Saturday in Seattle, the site of massive protests at the World Trade Organization (WTO) ministerial there in November 1999.

"The FTAA is everything that was bad about NAFTA, and so much more," said Gretchen Gordon, Executive Director of Citizens Trade Campaign. "It threatens our ability to maintain quality public services, to ensure a clean environment, or to regulate things like utilities or development. But the biggest underlying threat of the FTAA is the erosion of democracy."

ASJE Co-Chair David Foster, Director of the United Steelworkers of America's District 11, said the March to Miami "aims to focus the nation's attention on what has become a pivotal political issue in America today - the unprecedented loss of manufacturing jobs and the collapse of America's working class communities."

The FTAA, which Lori Wallach, Executive Director of Public Citizen's Global Trade Watch, condemned as "NAFTA on steroids," does not contain either environmental standards or labor rights as part of the core agreement, omissions that were uniformly condemned at the announcement by representatives of the Sierra Club, Citizens Trade Campaign, the National Family Farm Coalition, the Teamsters and the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists (CBTU).

Steelworkers Secretary-Treasurer Jim English said the sweeping job losses caused by NAFTA - pegged at 765,000 in a study conducted by the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) - have been compounded by the fact that corporations have used the threat of moving to Mexico to whipsaw unions in contract negotiations and to intimidate workers during organizing campaigns.

"The fact is," English said, "NAFTA has been a disaster for workers on both sides of the border. It has reduced wages by 22 percent for Mexican workers, and at the same it has cut by more than half the number of successful organizing campaigns in this country when employers threaten workers with moving their plants out of the country."

William Lucy, Secretary-Treasurer of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) and President of the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists (CBTU), added that the loss of manufacturing jobs caused by current trade policies is severely damaging both public sector budgets and inner city communities.

"When these trading policies wipe out millions of manufacturing jobs," Lucy said, "they also rip out the primary ladder that folks in minority communities have historically used to climb into the middle class. So for us, NAFTA and FTAA represent a kind of double jeopardy - drastic cuts to public budgets and a devastating loss of opportunities for inner city residents."

The March to Miami will pass through more than 20 U.S. cities, rallying support among the growing number of citizens and groups opposing the trade policies that are triggering the export of American jobs and undermining the quality of life in countless communities.

For more information, visit www.uswa.org.