Phyllis Schlafly: No Wonder Obama Won't Let Us Read TPP

Deal would separate us from Constitution and national sovereignty

By Phyllis Schlafly

On Friday, Congress disrupted President Obama’s plan for a sweeping transfer of U.S. sovereignty to an unaccountable group of foreign busybodies. Hurray for the stalwart Americans who resisted the demands of Obama, the Republican leadership and the big-donor claque – but Speaker Boehner plans to give Congress another chance this week to make this dangerous mistake.

The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) would turn over to globalists the power to issue regulations about U.S. trade, immigration, the environment, labor and commerce. It’s called a “living agreement,” which means the globalists can amend and change the text of the so-called agreement after it has gone into effect.


That reminds me of our supremacist judges who invented the term a ‘living” Constitution, which they can rewrite to comport with their own updated ideology. The globalists claim that this “living” document (TPP), now called Obamatrade, has all the powers of a treaty to commit the U.S. to new foreign obligations, although it certainly did not comply with any U.S. constitutional provisions for treaty ratification.

Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., has frankly warned about this giveaway of U.S. sovereignty. Not only would Congress give up its powers to negotiate and write the terms of a treaty, but Congress also gives up its power to debate and amend the deal, to apply a cloture vote in the Senate, and to require a two-thirds vote in the Senate.

The secrecy wrapped around TPP is appallingly un-American. Whatever happened to Obama’s promise of “transparency”? TPP was negotiated and agreed to by Obama’s trade representative and a bunch of foreigners in a secret room, and the American people are not allowed to know the details until after it’s a done deal.

TPP puts us in a new political and economic union before a single private citizen is told about it and with public opinion running five to one against it. Remember when Nancy Pelosi said we had to pass Obamacare in order to find out what is in it?

Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., warns, “TPP calls for the formation of a permanent political and economic union known as the Trans-Pacific Partnership Commission, which will have power to issue regulations impacting not only trade but immigration, the environment, labor and commerce.” He added, Congress “will have surrendered its legislative prerogatives. 

Before a word, line, paragraph, or page of this plan is made public, Congress will have even agreed to give up its treaty powers.”

Sen. Sessions made it even more emphatic, saying that fast track “authorizes the president to form a new transnational governance structure. … It confers the power to both compel and restrict changes to U.S. policy, to commit the U.S. to international obligations, and to cede sovereign authority to a foreign body.” This new global body could even add new member countries (such as China).

Sessions continued: “Congress would be pre-clearing a political and economic union before a word of that arrangement has been made available to a single private citizen. This has the earmarks of a nascent European Union,” and Americans certainly don’t want to belong to a European union (that’s why we fought the American Revolution).

Hunter also warns that the new global governance institution would be "authorized to issue policies and regulations affecting our economy, our manufacturers, our workers, our immigration procedures, as well as current labor and environmental practices."


TPP is separating us from the U.S. Constitution and from national sovereignty and replacing both with a global governance superstructure. TPP has wrapped its audacious global governance plan in the mantle called “free trade,” which is a misnomer if there ever were one.

“Free trade” means Americans must obey a bunch of rules written by foreigners (which we can’t veto), but China can ignore those rules. TPP didn’t even touch the subject of currency manipulation against us by Asian countries.

While the American people are denied the right to read TPP, thanks to leaks from WikiLeaks we have learned that Obamatrade includes 10 pages to unilaterally alter our current U.S. immigration law. Sen. Sessions says TPP will give Obama a backdoor to increase immigration, and the same lobbyists who are pushing for Obamatrade are demanding open borders.

Republicans need a bold program to bring back jobs that have been lost to Asian countries. Michele Bachmann summed up a pro-American verdict on TPP: “I hate it. It would empower the president, cut out congressional influence and lead to American jobs leaving the U.S.”