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<div class="column"><p class=""><span style="font-size: 18.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial,Bold'; background-color: rgb(100.000000%, 100.000000%, 100.000000%)" class="">TEAMSTERS UNION SUPPORTS IMPROVED USMCA
</span></p><p class=""><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">(WASHINGTON/LAVAL, QC) </span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">– </span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">Teamsters in both the United States and Canada are
coming out in support of the new NAFTA following changes to the agreement made by
Democrats in Congress.
</span></p><p class=""><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">The Teamsters Union has long opposed the North American Free Trade Agreement.
Teamsters jobs are tied to trade and our members have suffered the impact of the
original NAFTA for more than a quarter century. Teamsters want trade, but it has to be
fair trade that puts working people and their families first.
</span></p><p class=""><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">The USMCA agreement wasn’t worthy of ratification a year ago. Si</span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">nce then, the
Teamsters Union, House Democrats, our labor brothers and sisters and many other fair
trade allies worked to secure improvements to the agreement as signed by the party
countries. Now, for </span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">the first time, workers’ interests are protected by e</span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">nforceable labor
standards. The revised final USMCA is better than the initially signed USMCA
agreement and a significant improvement over the original NAFTA.
</span></p><p class=""><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">“</span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">The International Brotherhood of Teamsters will support this </span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">free trade agreement,”
</span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">Teamsters Ge</span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">neral President Jim Hoffa said. “The renegotiation of NAFTA and the
</span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">subsequent improvements made by Democratic leadership have resulted in a final
</span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">package that is superior to the original.”
</span></p><p class=""><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">“New improvements to labour rights and a more enforceable labour c</span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">hapter have made
</span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">a real difference,” Teamsters Canada President François Laporte said. “Nobody got
</span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">everything they wanted, but our union has decided not to make the perfect the enemy of
</span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">the good.”
</span></p><p class=""><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">The USMCA includes improvements which will directly benefit Teamster members.
Among these is the overdue fix to the cross-border trucking provision that threatened
highway safety and the competitiveness of the American trucking industry.
</span></p><p class=""><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">We recognize and thank USTR Lighthizer, House Ways and Means Chairman Richie
Neal (D-Mass.) and their staffs for their sincere commitment to this issue.
</span></p><p class=""><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial;" class="">As North America’s dairy workers’ union, we know that neither the American nor the
</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial;" class="">Canadian dairy industries got everything they wanted in the NAFTA renegotiation. Now
it's up to the Canadian government to compensate not just dairy farmers, but dairy
processing workers for losses stemming from recent trade agreements.</span></p></div></div></div><div class="page" title="Page 2"><div class="layoutArea"><div class="column"><p class=""><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">The USMCA represents good progress for working people. Trade rules in America will
be fairer and that is something for which we can be proud, but trade policy alone cannot
fully address economic injustice. To that end, the Teamsters Union has no greater
policy priority for the 116th Congress than p</span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">rotecting our members’ pensions and
</span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">addressing the multiemployer pension funding crisis. Signing the Butch Lewis Act into
law must be the next priority for this Congress and the Administration. We urge our
elected leadership to come together in a bipartisan manner now and work to achieve a
pension protection policy solution with the same level of commitment and urgency
applied to the USMCA negotiation process.
</span></p><p class=""><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">Teamsters represent close to 125,000 workers across Canada. Teamsters Canada is
affiliated to the International Brotherhood of Teamsters. Visit <a href="http://teamsters.ca" class="">teamsters.ca</a> for more
</span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">information. Follow us on Twitter @TeamstersCanada and “like” us on Facebook at
</span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class=""><a href="http://facebook.com/TeamstersCanada" class="">facebook.com/TeamstersCanada</a>.
</span></p><p class=""><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">Founded in 1903, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters represents 1.5 million
hardworking men and women throughout the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico.
</span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">Visit <a href="http://teamster.org" class="">teamster.org</a> for more information. Follow us on Twitter @Teamsters and “like” us
</span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial'" class="">on Facebook at <a href="http://facebook.com/teamsters" class="">facebook.com/teamsters</a>.
</span></p><p class=""><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Arial,Bold'" class="">-30- </span></p>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; border-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; "><div style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; " class=""><div class="">Arthur Stamoulis</div><div class="">Citizens Trade Campaign</div><div class="">(202) 494-8826</div><div class=""><br class=""></div></div></span><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"></span><br class="Apple-interchange-newline">
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