Unions Rally at Capitol Against China Trade Bill

Several thousand union members converged on Capitol Hill Wednesday to rally against the push to normalize trade relations with China, a show of force billed as one of organized labor’s largest demonstrations here in several years.

“All we’re going to do is lose our jobs to China,” said Steve Gliebe, 48, a union worker at a tire and rubber plant in Findley, Ohio. “This has got to be stopped.”

Gliebe and a crowd of steelworkers, auto workers, Teamsters and others that labor leaders estimated at 10,000 rallied in front of the Capitol on a windy afternoon before a giant banner that declared, “No Blank Check for China.”

The China protest was the first of what are expected to be several major demonstrations by disparate groups here this week aimed at the perceived dangers of international trade and the forces of globalization.

While labor rallied, other demonstrators gathered to target the spring meetings of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, which the protesters accuse of neglecting the world’s poor and harming the environment.

In Seattle in December, organized labor helped lead demonstrations airing similar grievances against a meeting of the World Trade Organization. The Seattle marches grew violent. This week, labor is expected to play a smaller role in the protests aimed at the World Bank and IMF.

Mindful that speeches and banners on Capitol Hill are a dime a dozen, Gliebe and others among the rank-and-file workers turned from the protest to the real task at hand: lobbying. They fanned out to House and Senate offices to press their case in person with lawmakers--or, more likely, congressional aides--who are well aware that the decision on whether to permanently extend full trading privileges to China will be one of the most sensitive issues of this election year.

“The door-to-door stuff is good,” said an aide to one Democrat who leans toward supporting the trade bill. “That’s clearly the way to lobby members of Congress. They will always listen, no doubt about that.” The debate over China trade has entered a critical period. Although pro-trade forces appear to have a wide margin for passage in the Senate, a showdown vote in the closely divided House is scheduled for the week of May 21.

House Democrats--split between free-traders who support the Clinton administration’s bid to normalize trade relations with the Chinese and union backers critical of China’s record on labor and human rights--are anxious to put the issue behind them before they turn to the fall campaign. A spokeswoman for Rep. Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.) said Wednesday that the House minority leader, who has remained publicly uncommitted, is likely to announce his position during a two-week recess scheduled to start next week.

The pending bill would grant China permanent normal trade ties, thereby eliminating the annual congressional review of these relations. The administration last year promised China that it would end such reviews as part of an agreement paving the way for the country’s entry into the World Trade Organization.

Leading Republicans dismissed the impact of the union rally.

Rep. David Dreier (R-San Dimas), who is helping to shepherd the China trade bill through the House, said the demonstrators “can’t change the fact that the sky is blue, the Earth is round and trade is key to the United States, creating 20 million new jobs and the lowest unemployment in four decades.” Business lobbies have flown in chief executives to lean on undecided House members. The American Chamber of Commerce in China came to Washington this week to press the case for normalized trade relations, a Republican aide said, and the chamber’s Hong Kong branch plans to do the same next week.

At Wednesday’s rally, leaders of the AFL-CIO, the United Auto Workers, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and the American Federation of Teachers fired away at a bill championed by a Democratic president they helped elect. They called the legislation a sellout both to U.S. workers who have fought for fair labor standards and to Chinese workers who lack collective bargaining rights and, they charged, are exploited by the state from childhood.

Aiming his words at undecided House members, UAW President Steve Yokich said: “We expect you to stand up for us . . . for human rights . . . for worker rights . . . for decent wages . . . for good working conditions . . . against child labor in China . . . against corporate greed.”

Others at the rally included Reform Party presidential hopeful Patrick J. Buchanan, sporting a Teamsters jacket. Three congressional members from California, all Democrats, also lent their names as backers of the gathering: Reps. Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco, Joe Baca of San Bernardino and Brad Sherman of Sherman Oaks.

Times staff writer Jonathan Peterson contributed to this report.