Hearings to examine the nomination of Jamieson Greer, of Maryland, to be United States Trade Representative, with the rank of Ambassador.

Committee on Finance

2025-02-06

Source: Congress.gov

Participants

Transcript

The committee will return to order.  Senator Wyden and I will give our introductory statements, and then we will go to a good friend and colleague, Senator Hagerty, and then we will go ahead with our testimony, Mr. Greer, for your hearing.   Mr. Greer, I would welcome you and congratulate you on your nomination.  By traditional timelines, this is one of the earliest dates the Finance Committee has held a nomination hearing for the USTR.  Your cooperation and timely responses to questions from both sides of the aisle expedited the Committee's very demanding process.  Mr. Greer is nominated by the President for an incredibly important job.   America's chief trade negotiator.  By statute, and frankly in accordance with our Constitution, our negotiator must report to Congress, which means he reports to the Finance Committee.  This week attention fell on President Trump's executive orders to help secure our borders from illegal immigration and fentanyl smuggling.  I strongly support securing our borders and fighting fentanyl trafficking.   The executive orders rely on International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEPA, and concern drug policy and border security.  The President, not the USTR, invokes IEPA.  And the Department of Homeland Security, not the USTR, is responsible for securing our borders.   Nonetheless, I am securing briefings on these orders and, in fact, Customs and Border Protection will brief the Committee on this matter today.  What the President has done that is different, though, is to bring tariffs into the discussion about border security.   USTR is, as I said, America's chief trade negotiator.  Anytime the U.S. government is considering tariffs or something that implicates trade policy, he, the USTR, should be a part of those conversations and should report to us about those conversations and solicit our input.
Right now, Mr. Greer is not in the government and not privy to various discussions.  Confirming him will allow him to be a part of those conversations and to work with this committee, ensuring that Congress fulfills its constitutional responsibilities over international trade.   When we look at whether Jameson Greer will be a good negotiator for America's trade interests and a partner to this committee, his experience and skill set indicate the answer is yes.  He understands the USTR's policymaking since he served as its chief of staff.  At USTR, he distinguished himself as an effective negotiator in his work on the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement, or USMCA, which overwhelmingly passed Congress.   As many of my Democrat colleagues know firsthand, he worked closely with them on their priorities for USMCA.  As an accomplished international trade attorney, he is an expert on our trade agreements and trade laws, including the requirements to report to Congress promptly and thoroughly.  We need an effective USTER now more than ever.   Frankly, our last USTR did not negotiate any agreements, and we lost ground to foreign competitors.  The Biden administration walked away even from its own limited initiatives, such as the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework.   Rather than forge new rules to combat China's trade practices, the prior administration turned its back on existing rules and positions, such as our intellectual property rights under the WTO TRIPS agreement and support for open data flows and non-discrimination against our technology companies.   The Biden administration also dawdled on enforcement of our existing trade agreements, including by failing to act against protectionist measures on our U.S. agriculture and energy producers.  Finally, there was one other major USTR failure during the last administration.

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