Politico Slimes Trade Rep Katherine Tai

Politico is out with a nasty piece about US Trade Rep Katherine Tai that shows just how much corporate hacks dislike her because of her effective advocacy for American workers, consumers, and small businesses trying to compete with global corporate behemoths. In the article, mostly unnamed sources complain about all the digital trade deals she isn’t getting done (deals that would eviscerate the ability of Congress to regulate Big Tech) and how she is being mean to people in government with different trade agendas than hers.

The fact that there is someone as pro-worker and as progressive Katherine Tai, with her track record and positioning on trade, at an agency like USTR is indeed a news story -- just not the kind the corporate PR folks want to talk about. USTR for more than 50 years has arguably been the most consistently pro-big business agency in the US government, whether a Republican or Democratic president was in the White House. Bill Clinton’s trade reps negotiated NAFTA and bringing China into the World Trade Organization. Barack Obama’s trade rep was Mike Froman, formerly of Citigroup, whose great passion was getting the highly pro-corporate Trans-Pacific Trade Partnership through. Fortunately, he failed in that mission.

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