Is Anyone Still Defending Trade Deals These Days?

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I’m curious: is there anyone left who defends trade deals these days? Anyone who thinks NAFTA benefited the US; who thinks the WTO is a pretty good system; who thinks TPP is a good idea; and who supports all the smaller bilateral trade deals of the past couple of decades?

Actually, let me rephrase that. I know there are lots of people who believe all this. But is there anyone left willing to say so in public? Literally every single presidential candidate has been flogging trade deals for the past few months, but no one seems to be fighting back. Is it just not worth it? Does everyone figure it’s nothing more than campaign posturing, and once the election is over we can go back to passing trade deals the same as we always have? Or what?

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Mother Jones was founded to do journalism differently. We stand for justice and democracy. We reject false equivalence. We go after stories others don’t. We’re a nonprofit newsroom, because the kind of truth-telling investigations we do doesn’t happen under corporate ownership.

And the essential ingredient that makes all this possible? Readers like you.

It’s reader support that enables Mother Jones to devote the time and resources to report the facts that are too difficult, expensive, or inconvenient for other news outlets to uncover. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

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