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Rev. Jesse Jackson on Free Trade Civil Rights Activist

American workers can’t compete with slave labor

The American worker can complete with the Mexican worker or the Chinese worker. The American worker cannot compete with slave labor and should not have to. Let us raise their standards and not lower our own.

Working people cannot afford adding Chile to NAFTA

We must insist on a trade policy that serves working people, not Wall Street speculators-one that lifts wages and conditions abroad and does not lower them here. But to do that we must take our government back. We must end the reign of money politics that makes a mockery of our democracy.

Joined with Perot as “Odd Couple” in opposing NAFTA

Leaders of both parties-Bush, Clinton, Gingrich, Gramm, Dole-pushed this NAFTA treaty through. Brother Perot and I were called the Odd Couple for opposing it. But everything we said turned out to be true. Wages plummeted in Mexico. Mexicans are poorer. Jobs have been lost here. When the crunch came, the $30 bailout did not bail out the American workers who lost their jobs, nor did it bail out Mexican workers. It bailed out the speculators and the investors. We must have a fair international trade agreements that lifts up working people.