House defeats bill on Vietnam trade
WASHINGTON - Legislation to normalize trade relations with Vietnam was defeated unexpectedly in the House on Monday, four days before President Bush makes his first visit to the country.
What the Bush administration hoped would be a quick endorsement turned into at least a temporary setback when the measure ran into opposition from legislators in textile-producing states worried about unfair competition -- and from San Jose Rep. Zoe Lofgren, who urged colleagues in the House to defeat the measure because Vietnam has not made enough progress on human rights.
The measure failed to win the necessary two-thirds majority it needed to pass under a procedure House Republicans adopted in an effort to rush it through with limited debate. It received 228 votes in support -- 32 short of what was needed. There were 161 votes against it.
Ways and Means Committee aides, however, said Republicans planned to bring the measure up again Wednesday under normal procedures that will require only a majority for passage. The 228 votes it received were 10 more than the 218 majority that would be needed under the normal process.
The administration is hoping to gain approval of the measure before Bush meets later this week with Vietnamese leaders in Hanoi.
Lofgren, a Democrat, opposed the trade deal because, she said, the government ``has repeatedly violated human rights and religious freedom.''
One of Lofgren's Vietnamese-American constituents, Cong Thanh Do, was held in a Vietnamese prison for more than a month because he advocated democracy for Vietnam.
``Given the alarming human rights violations currently under way in Vietnam, it seems a mistake for our country to grant PNTR (permanent normal trade relations) to Vietnam without requiring that the Vietnamese government make significant improvements in respecting human rights, free speech and freedom of religion,'' Lofgren said.
Do, a 47-year-old engineer at Applied Materials who wrote pro-democracy messages on the Web under a pseudonym, was arrested during a trip to Vietnam this summer to meet supporters and held for 38 days on vague terror charges. He was released in September and deported to the United States.
He denied any connection with a terror plot.
Among Bay Area legislators voting with Zofgren to defeat the measure were Rep. Tom Lantos, D-San Mateo, and Rep. Lynn Woolsey, D-Santa Rosa.
Reps. Anna Eshoo, D-Palo Alto, Mike Honda, D-Campbell, and Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, were among those voting for the measure. Backers of the legislation said that withholding trade status from Vietnam would hurt U.S. companies and not force changes on human rights.
Even if backers succeed in getting the measure passed in the House this week, it faces obstacles in the Senate, where the administration has had to offer textile-state senators assurances that it will impose penalty tariffs on Vietnamese textile products if the country is found to be selling those products at unfairly low prices.
U.S. retailers were pushing for assurances that these anti-dumping duties would not be used in an arbitrary fashion to keep Vietnamese products off U.S. store shelves.
The Senate is not expected to vote on the measure until December.
Under the terms of its membership in the Geneva-based WTO, Vietnam will be required to reduce its tariffs on American and other foreign goods to 15 percent or less, a move that would cover 94 percent of U.S. manufactured goods and 75 percent of U.S. farm goods.
Vietnam, which was cleared last week to become the WTO's 150th member, also agreed to open up telecommunications, financial services and energy to competition by American and other foreign companies.
Bush is expected to arrive in Vietnam for a two-day ``CEO summit'' Saturday and Sunday sponsored by Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, a multinational organization supporting trade and economic development in Asia and the Pacific Rim.
The Vietnam trade bill was heavily supported by U.S. business executives who are anxious to get into one of the fastest-growing markets in Southeast Asia. It was just the latest milestone in a two-decade effort to normalize relations that had been severed by the Vietnam War.
Through September, U.S. exports to Vietnam have totaled $724 million while Vietnamese shipments to the United States totaled $6.4 billion.
By Frank Davies & K. Oanh Ha - The Mercury News - November 14, 2006.
Vietnam regrets defeat of US trade bill, hopes for new vote soon
Vietnam expressed disappointment Tuesday at the initial defeat of a key trade bill in the US Congress, and a government spokesman said he hoped the measure would be passed soon.
The Republican leadership of the US House of Representatives failed Monday to round up the two-thirds majority needed to rush through permanent normal trade relations (PNTR) with Vietnam.
The measure received 228 votes for passage and 161 against, falling short of the two-thirds needed for the passage in the 435-strong chamber under special rules to pass it without a debate.
"It is very regrettable that the US House of Representative has not approved the bill," said Le Dung, spokesman for the Foreign Affairs Ministry who said the early defeat failed "to meet with the interest and aspiration of the two countries, especially the interest of US business."
Vietnam was approved last week to become the 150th member of the World Trade Organization. However, until normal trade relations are approved, the WTO rules will not apply to trade between the United States and Vietnam.
Without the WTO regulations, Vietnamese exports - including garments, its largest non-oil export - would still be restricted in the United States while American companies could not take advantage of hard-fought WTO concessions in opening up Vietnamese markets.
The initial defeat came a few days before US President George W Bush, who has endorsed normal relations with Vietnam, is to arrive in Hanoi for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit.
Congressional leaders have said they would resubmit the bill this week under normal debate rules, which would require a simple majority.
The same 228 votes would allow the measure to pass by simple majority in the House, but the bill would still need to be approved by the US Senate, where lawmakers seeking to protect US textile industries or punish Vietnam's human-rights record could still block its passage.
"We hope that the US Congress will approve PNTR to Vietnam at an early date, thus contributing to promoting the relations between the two countries," Dung said Tuesday.
On Monday, the Bush administration formally endorsed the bill. The president's Office of Management and Budget said in a statement that the bill would allow the United States and Vietnam to enjoy the benefits of Vietnam's membership in the WTO.
Vietnam has been hoping President Bush would arrive to normal trade relations when he attends the APEC summit in the capital city of Hanoi Saturday and Sunday.
The United States is now Vietnam's largest export market with nearly US$6 billion in exports last year.
The United States exported only about 1 billion dollars in goods to Vietnam, a trade deficit that contributes to lingering opposition to easing trade restrictions for Vietnam.
Thanh Nien / Deutsche Presse Agentur - November 14, 2006.
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