TPP Negotiators Again Fail to Clinch Deal

Another last ditch effort to come to agreement on the controversial Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal failed last week in Maui, Hawaii.

While the lack of a deal this year pushes the TPP into presidential year politics as an issue, it is good news for workers and the environment considering the TPP's threats to jobs, wages, safe food, affordable medicines and more.

Many of the 28 House Democrats who voted to give the Obama administration Fast Track authority on trade deals set specific conditions for that support, including strong, enforceable labor and environmental standards, and no rolling back of past patent rule reforms relating to access to medicines. The U.S., for instance, is insisting on lengthening times for drugs patents, a position other countries reject.

The TPP figures to face even more intense scrutiny when these members of Congress and the public see specific TPP terms that threaten their interests. Issues like investor-state dispute resolution, medicine patents, and market access issues like sugar, dairy, and rules-of-origin on manufactured goods like autos remain deadlocked at the bargaining table.

Meanwhile, Reuters reports this week that the State Department's improbable upgrade of Malaysia from the ranks of the world's worst human rights offenders happened despite objections from the agency's own human rights experts ( see previous story).

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