A former congressman, World Trade Organization Appellate Board chairman and longtime trade analyst has outlined his pro-trade agenda for the Democratic Party: "reclaim" congressional trade authority; eliminate the Trump administration's "unilateral tariffs"; recommit to multilateralism; "renew the commitment to the rule of law in trade"; strive for "mutually beneficial" trade relations with China, based on the rule of law; support "freer trade bilateral and multilateral relationships"; and commit to domestic programs that enhance U.S. competitiveness. In a policy analysis for the Cato Institute, where he serves as an adjunct scholar for the free-market organization, former Rep. James Bacchus (D-FL) says "whether or not Democrats win the presidency and control of the Congress in 2021, they should adopt a pro-?trade agenda that centers on renewing support for trade as a policy that can benefit all Americans." He endorses a U.S. commitment "to reform the WTO by modernizing it as a fully 21st-?century international trade institution," at the same time supporting trade rules, "including exclusive reliance on the WTO dispute settlement mechanism for resolving all trade disputes with other WTO members that fall within the scope of the WTO treaty." Bacchus brings with him decades of trade-experience, as a two-term congressman from Florida, a two-term Appellate Board chairman, a global affairs attorney with Greenburg Traurig and (currently) director of the Center for Global Economic and Environmental Opportunity at the University of Central Florida. He argues the Democrats "must do what virtually no one in national politics in either party has tried to do lately: they must remind all the American people why being for trade is in their best interest and why being against trade is not. Support for trade must be an essential part of any overall Democratic economic policy that aspires to restore and revitalize American prosperity."
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