Act Now: Tell Congress a NAFTA Replacement Must End Job Outsourcing and Protect the Environment!

Too many Americans haven’t seen a real pay increase since the eighties and can’t find better-paying jobs in part because of corporate-rigged trade deals like the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Now NAFTA is being renegotiated, and the deadline is looming. The stakes could not be higher for workers and the environment throughout North America.

NAFTA grants corporations vast new privileges that make it easier to outsource jobs while empowering them to attack the environmental and health laws on which we all rely.

NAFTA’s lack of labor or environmental standards means wages in Mexico are now below those in China. Under NAFTA, U.S. firms that outsource production to Mexico can pay industrial workers less than $2 an hour and dump toxins with impunity. And then ship the products back here for sale under NAFTA's favorable terms.

To date, almost one million American jobs have been certified by the government as lost to NAFTA, with more being outsourced every week.

Already, multinational corporations have grabbed $392 million in taxpayer money using NAFTA’s infamous Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) tribunals.

ISDS empowers corporations to sue governments before a panel of three corporate lawyers. These lawyers can order taxpayers to pay the corporations unlimited sums of money, including for the loss of their expected future profits.

The multinational corporations only need to convince the lawyers that a law protecting public health, a food safety regulation or a pro-environment court ruling violates their special NAFTA rights. The corporate lawyers' decisions are not subject to appeal.

As representatives from Mexico, the United States and Canada rush to finish NAFTA renegotiations, we must fight for a deal that puts people and the planet above corporate profits.

Contacting Arizona Senator Flake:

https://www.flake.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/contact-jeff

Washington, D.C. Office
P: 202-224-4521
F: 202-228-0515

Phoenix Office
P: 602-840-1891
F: 602-840-4092

Tucson Office
P: 520-575-8633
F: 520-797-3232

Senators contact information: 

https://contactingcongress.org

Ask your Congress Members to make sure that the NAFTA replacement:

• Eliminates the Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) system and the special investor protections it enforces that make it less risky and cheaper to outsource jobs, and that also empower corporations to attack environmental and health laws before tribunals of three corporate lawyers and get unlimited payouts of our tax dollars.
• And adds strong labor and environmental standards with swift and certain enforcement to raise wages and strengthen lax environmental rules in Mexico to prevent companies from moving jobs to pay workers a pittance and dump toxins.

Fight ISDA - a NAFTA clause that allows corporations to sue governments that pass environmental or labor protection laws that hurt their profits

Ethyl's lawyers disputed the Canadian government's ban on the known neurotoxin MMA

The next round of NAFTA renegotiation talks are scheduled for October in Washington, D.C. and SumOfUs is showing up big time. With your help, we're demanding an end to the dangerous clause buried inside NAFTA that allows corporations to sue governments and be awarded unlimited sums in secretive tribunals of corporate lawyers.

That's right, because of some heavy corporate lobbying, the clause, known as Investor State Dispute Settlement (ISDS), allows corporate executives to dispute a country’s laws, like important environmental and labor protection laws, if it is deemed these policies will negatively impact the corporation's profits.
Join the fight against NAFTA corporate power-grabbing, sign now!

In one ISDS jurisdiction, the Canadian government was forced to pay $13 million in damages and legal fees to a giant chemical manufacturing company known as Ethyl. In the lawsuit, Ethyl's lawyers disputed the Canadian government's ban on the known neurotoxin MMA, which is, by no coincidence, an Ethyl product. Ethyl lawyers bullied the government in the secretive ISDS tribunal to lift the ban on the company's product AND pay the corporation $13 million in damages and legal fees. This abuse of ISDS forced the Canadian government to prioritize corporate profits over public health and the environment.

This can't continue. Now more than ever it's important we stay vigilant to make sure that corporate interests don’t hijack these important renegotiations. Lobbyists and corporate executives are counting on the public to not pay attention so they can keep expanding their profit-centered ISDS clause and continue undermining important laws. Let’s show them that we're paying attention and we're not going anywhere.

- SumOfUs

NAFTA’s Legacy: Expanding Corporate Power to Attack Public Interests Laws, Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch, 1 February 2017
The Court That Rules The World, Buzzfeed, 28 August 2016
NAFTA's ISDS: Why Canada Is One of the Most Sued Countries in the World, CommonDreams, 23 October 2015.
Investor-State Attacks: Health, ISDS Corporate Attacks, September 2017