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Washington, DC – As President Obama prepares to leave for Asia in another attempt to finalize the stalled Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiations, a broad coalition of labor, environmental and consumer groups delivered over half a million petition signatures and letters to key Congressional leaders today opposing Fast Track authority for the pact. 

“CWA activists are focusing all our efforts on stopping Fast Track authority for the Trans-Pacific Partnership.  Millions of labor, environmental, community and human rights activists are fighting back and demanding that the White House and Congress put U.S. citizens ahead of the corporate and financial interests that already define and dominate the global economy,” said Communications Workers of America president Larry Cohen.

“Fast Track is as dead in the water post-election as it was before it,” said Arthur Stamoulis, executive director of Citizens Trade Campaign.  “After all the secrecy and back-room dealmaking surrounding the TPP negotiations, there’s no way the public, civil society or responsible policymakers will allow the pact to be rushed through Congress.”

President Obama is heading to Asia this weekend for a week of summits and meetings aimed, in part, at bringing the TPP to conclusion. The TPP is a twelve-nation pact that would set rules affecting approximately 40% of the global economy, covering not only tariffs and quotas, but everything from financial regulations and public procurement to medicine patents and environmental policy.  While various leaked texts from the TPP negotiations have been published by Citizens Trade Campaign and WikiLeaks, none of the U.S. proposals or composite texts has every been officially released for review by the public.

The White House and various corporate lobby groups are calling for to TPP be approved under “Fast Track” trade promotion authority, an expired, Nixon-era policy-making process that would allow the pact to circumvent ordinary Congressional review, amendment and debate procedures.

A total of 663,674 letters, email actions and petition signatures opposing Fast Track were delivered to House Speaker John Boehner and Senate Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden today, from 350.org, AFL-CIO, Citizens Trade Campaign, Communications Workers of America, Corporate Accountability International, CREDO, Democracy for America, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Fight for the Future, Firedoglake, International Brotherhood of Teamsters, MoveOn.org, Organic Consumers Association, Public Citizen, Sierra Club, SumOfUs.org and others.

“We’re calling on Congress members to affirm their opposition to Fast Track now and into the future,” said Mike Dolan, Teamsters’ legislative representative and CTC vice president.  “The Fast Track legislation introduced back in January didn’t go anywhere this year, and won’t go anywhere during Lame Duck or the new session, because policymakers and the public alike rightly view it as an abdication of Congress’ authority and responsibility when it comes to shaping trade policy for the benefit of working families. This isn’t something minor ‘tweaks’ are able to fix.”