<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><div class=""><a href="https://x.com/citizenstrade/status/1753412101241004490?s=20" class=""><b class="">Please retweet here</b></a></div><div class=""><br class=""></div>For Immediate Release<br class=""><div class=""><div class="">Contact: Arthur Stamoulis, (202) 494-8826 or <a href="mailto:media@citizenstrade.org" class="">media@citizenstrade.org</a> </div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><div class=""><div class="" style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;"><div class=""><div class=""><div class=""><span class=""><font size="5" class=""><b class="">Groups Praise USTR Tai for Defending Privacy, Workers & Civil Rights in “Digital Trade” Negotiations</b></font></span></div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Washington, D.C. — Civil society groups across a range of sectors sent a <a href="https://www.citizenstrade.org/ctc/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/DigitalTradeThankYouLetter_020224.pdf" class="">letter to President Biden</a> today praising U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) Katherine Tai for withdrawing U.S. support for Trump-era “digital trade” proposals that would have undermined privacy, worker rights and AI accountability. </div><div class=""><br class=""></div></div></div></div></div><div class=""><font class="">“Good-paying jobs, civil rights and personal privacy are all at stake in the so-called ‘digital trade’ debate. We deeply appreciate President Biden and Ambassador Tai standing firm in support of a worker-centered trade agenda that preserves space for needed public interest policies,” said </font><b class="">Arthur Stamoulis, executive director of Citizens Trade Campaign</b><span class="">.</span></div><div class=""><span class=""><br class=""></span></div><div class=""><span class="">“As policymakers start paying more and more attention to the oversized role Big Tech plays in our society, the industry is attempting to use trade agreements as a backdoor means of restricting future consumer privacy, AI accountability and anti-monopoly policies here in the U.S. and around the world,” said <b class="">Ed Mierzwinski, senior director of U.S. PIRG.</b> “Consumer advocates join the many voices thanking Ambassador Tai for fending off Big Tech’s ‘digital trade’ sneak attack on sound public interest policies.”</span></div><div class=""><font class=""><br class=""></font></div><div class=""><font class=""><div class=""><div class="">The letter’s 41 organizational signers include: Accountable Tech, AI Now Institute, Citizens Trade Campaign, Communications Workers of America (CWA), Consumer Federation of America, Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), National Association of Consumer Advocates, National Family Farm Coalition, National Organization for Women, Public Citizen, Rethink Trade, Service Employees International Union (SEIU), Tech Oversight Project, Trade Justice Education Fund, United Methodist Church General Board of Church and Society, U.S. PIRG and others.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div></div></font></div><div class=""><div class="" style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;"><div class=""><div class=""><div class="">The groups together commended USTR Tai for “leading the update of 'digital trade' rules to provide the policy space necessary for our nation to enact urgently needed policies on Big Tech competition, gig worker rights, online consumer privacy and data security protections, and AI accountability measures.” </div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">A PDF of today’s letter is available at: <a href="https://www.citizenstrade.org/ctc/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/DigitalTradeThankYouLetter_020224.pdf" class="">https://www.citizenstrade.org/ctc/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/DigitalTradeThankYouLetter_020224.pdf</a></div></div><div class=""><u class=""><br class=""></u></div><div class=""><span class="" style="caret-color: rgb(34, 34, 34); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Earlier this week, more than 50 </span>consumer and digital rights organizations in other countries <a href="https://dtalliance.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/JSI-Civil-Society-Letter-2024.pdf" class="">wrote to their governments</a> expressing support for the Biden administration’s decision and urging their governments to follow suit. </div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">###</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><div class="WordSection1"><p class="MsoNormal">President Joseph R. Biden<br class="">The White House<br class="">1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW<br class="">Washington, DC 20500<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal">February 2, 2024<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal">Dear President Biden,<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal">We thank you for your commitment to move our nation forward to a new trade policy that benefits most Americans, and appreciate administration efforts to ensure that trade policies are redesigned to support, not undermine, important policy goals. Specifically, we write to commend U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) Ambassador Katherine Tai for leading the update of “digital trade” rules to provide the policy space necessary for our nation to enact urgently needed policies on Big Tech competition, gig worker rights, online consumer privacy and data security protections, and AI accountability measures.<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal">USTR’s recent action to withdraw U.S. support for the four extreme “digital trade” provisions that the previous administration proposed at the World Trade Organization (WTO) is an important first step to ensuring that Big Tech interests cannot commandeer trade negotiations to undermine the important platform accountability policies being developed by Congress and your administration. The provisions from which USTR withdrew U.S. support do not appear in most other countries’ agreements nor in most U.S. free trade agreements that have had E-Commerce chapters over the past two decades.<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal">These harmful, but now thankfully withdrawn, provisions include:<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoListParagraph" style="margin-left: 0.5in; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span class="" style="font-family: Symbol;">·<span class="" style="font-stretch: normal; font-size: 7pt; line-height: normal; font-family: "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><b class=""><span class="" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;">Two provisions that guarantee tech firms nearly absolute control of our personal data. They ban government policies</span></b><span class="" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;"> <b class="">to protect our privacy and ensure data security, such as proposals to prevent Americans’ data going to bad actors overseas.</b> Other WTO members support a more balanced version of “Data Flows” and “Location of Computing Facilities” rules that preserves governments’ rights to regulate;<br class=""><br class=""><o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoListParagraph" style="margin-left: 0.5in; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span class="" style="font-family: Symbol;">·<span class="" style="font-stretch: normal; font-size: 7pt; line-height: normal; font-family: "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><b class=""><span class="" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;">A provision that provides tech firms special secrecy guarantees that would thwart government review of algorithms and Artificial Intelligence to curb racial discrimination, gender discrimination, labor violations, and more, while also undermining the “Right to Repair” your administration has acknowledged as vital. </span></b><span class="" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;">The WTO already requires countries to provide trade secrets protection for business-confidential information. This “Source Code” rule would forbid meaningful government oversight altogether. Our trade agreements should not provide special secrecy rights to digital firms to evade government oversight; and<br class=""><br class=""><o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoListParagraph" style="margin-left: 0.5in; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span class="" style="font-family: Symbol;">·<span class="" style="font-stretch: normal; font-size: 7pt; line-height: normal; font-family: "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><b class=""><span class="" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;">A provision that undermines antitrust and competition policy and enforcement of labor, health, or other laws in the digital sphere that may affect larger firms more.</span></b><span class="" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;"> This rule twists a trade principle called non-discrimination to make facially neutral laws that may have a disparate impact on foreign firms an illegal trade barrier.<o:p class=""></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal">We are eager to work with your administration to create new digital trade rules that promote worker rights, consumer privacy, civil rights, and data security goals. We know that good rules for the global economy allow governments to retain policy space to regulate, while in the digital sphere also promoting data flows and disciplining actual discrimination.<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal">Even if Big Tech lobbyists may be upset that their efforts to quietly preempt online privacy and antitrust policies, gig worker protections and AI oversight policies are derailed, most Americans will be thrilled to learn that your administration stood up for them. We stand by you on this.<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal">Sincerely,</p></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Citizens Trade Campaign<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Accountable Tech<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">AI Now Institute<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">American Economic Liberties Project<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">American Family Voices<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">American Friends Service Committee<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Campaign for America's Future<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Center for Digital Democracy<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Center for Economic Justice<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Coalition of Labor Union Women <o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Communications Workers of America (CWA)<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Consumer Federation of America<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Defending Rights & Dissent<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Demand Progress Education Fund<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Government Information Watch<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Justice Is Global<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Kapor Center<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Maryknoll Office for Global Concerns<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Media Alliance <o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">National Association of Consumer Advocates<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">National Family Farm Coalition<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">National Organization for Women<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">NETWORK Lobby for Catholic Social Justice <o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Open MIC<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Pax Christi USA<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Pride at Work<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Progressive Democrats of America<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Public Citizen<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Rethink Trade<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Revolving Door Project<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Service Employees International Union (SEIU)<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Sisters of Mercy of the Americas Justice Team<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Social Security Works<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC)<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">The Tech Oversight Project<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">The United Methodist Church General Board of Church and Society<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Trade Justice Education Fund<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">Transport Workers Union of America<o:p class=""></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;">U.S. PIRG</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 1pt 0.1in; text-indent: -0.1in;"><span class="" style="text-indent: -0.1in;">United Steelworkers</span></p><div class=""><br class=""></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><br class=""><br class=""><div class=""><br class="">
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