Key Panels Back China Trade Bill by Large Margins

Two influential congressional panels overwhelmingly approved legislation Wednesday granting permanent normal trade ties to China, giving the controversial measure new momentum as it heads for a showdown on the House floor next week.

While both committees are known as pro-trade bastions, the crushing margins of victory for the China trade bill nonetheless were striking. With several fence-sitters declaring their support, the House Ways and Means Committee embraced the bill by a vote of 34 to 4. The Senate Finance Committee also weighed in, 18 to 1.

The legislation, which would end the practice of reviewing China’s trade status each year, now moves into its endgame in the House. Opponents and proponents are fiercely wooing a few dozen holdouts from both parties as the House heads toward a momentous vote next week on an issue that has torn Republicans and Democrats alike.

The Ways and Means vote and interviews with key lawmakers suggest that proponents made significant headway after Republican leaders agreed late Tuesday to include a provision in the trade bill to help guard against the threat of sudden surges of Chinese imports into U.S. markets.

In addition, the top Democrat on Ways and Means, Rep. Charles B. Rangel of New York, endorsed the trade bill this week and pushed hard to win over fence-sitters from his party feeling heat from union lobbyists who contend that the deal would cost American jobs.

One key convert was Rep. Karen L. Thurman (D-Fla.), a member of Ways and Means who announced Wednesday that she would support the trade bill--but only if the safeguards against surging imports and other concessions on human rights and labor standards are part of the final package.

Thurman, noting that she had voted against the North American Free Trade Agreement and other trade measures, said that reaching a decision on the China bill was “an incredible emotional struggle” for her--and for many fellow Democrats.

“You want to make sure that you’re not giving away jobs, that you’re not selling this economy out,” Thurman said. She insisted that she received no favors in return for her vote. “This is purely about what I thought was in the best interests of the country.”

Other previously undecided committee members who moved into the yes column included Reps. Benjamin L. Cardin (D-Md.), Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas), Richard E. Neal (D-Mass.), J. D. Hayworth (R-Ariz.) and Jim Nussle (R-Iowa). Neal said that President Clinton leaned on him Tuesday to endorse the measure, even though he has voted with organized labor for most of his career. “Look, it’s a leap of faith for me,” Neal acknowledged after the vote.

All four opponents on the House committee were Democrats. Among them were Reps. Pete Stark of Hayward and Gerald D. Kleczka of Wisconsin. “It’s not that we don’t want to trade with China,” Kleczka said. “We just don’t want to fling open the doors of this country to trade with China and never have it reviewed again.”

Top House Democrats who are lobbying against the bill downplayed Wednesday’s votes.

House Minority Whip David E. Bonior (D-Mich.) told reporters that they should not be unduly impressed by a lopsided vote in a committee that has been historically pro-trade. “This is going to be a very, very close and tight vote,” Bonior said of next week’s scheduled vote by the full House, predicting that two-thirds of the 211 House Democrats would oppose the bill.

For their part, proponents cautioned against overconfidence even as they cheered the committee votes.

“This remains a difficult vote for many members. And the situation still remains fluid. But we are very encouraged,” said Charlene Barshefsky, the U.S. trade representative.

Barshefsky led a Clinton administration team last year that negotiated a bilateral trade agreement in which China pledged to lower tariffs and quotas significantly. Since then, she has lobbied lawmakers nonstop, testifying in hearing after hearing that U.S. businesses will not reap the benefits of the bilateral deal and China’s impending entry into the World Trade Organization unless Congress approves permanent normal trade relations.

Clinton, in a commencement speech at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy in New London, Conn., declared Wednesday that the trade vote “is profoundly important to America’s continued leadership in the world.”

He added: “If Congress votes to normalize trade relations with China, it will not guarantee that China will take the right course. But it will certainly increase the likelihood that it will.”

Republican strategists who favor permanent trade ties acknowledged that one-third of their 222 House members are likely to vote against any China trade measure because of their loathing for the Beijing regime. As a result, they have been forced to negotiate with moderate Democrats on proposals that many Republican leaders would have preferred to ignore.

Ways and Means Committee Chairman Bill Archer (R-Texas) accepted the provision on Chinese import protections only after he was satisfied that it was consistent with international trade rules and the U.S. agreement with China. In addition, he acknowledged, the provision would attract needed votes, including those of a few Northeastern Republicans with large union constituencies.

The provision would allow the president, in certain circumstances, to aid U.S. industries and workers buffeted by a sudden, overwhelming influx of Chinese imports. It helped win over some lawmakers who last year were irate about foreign countries dumping steel in U.S. markets.

Other compromise measures, which opponents have denounced as toothless, are likely to be considered alongside the trade bill as it moves next through the House Rules Committee and onto the floor. One would create a blue-ribbon commission to monitor human rights and labor standards in China.

Momentum on the trade bill has seesawed in recent weeks as both sides have touted endorsements of greater and lesser importance and played a game of inflating and deflating expectations.

A survey published Wednesday by the National Journal found that more than 100 members of the 435-member House are still officially undecided, while both sides are still well short of a majority. Reuters said that the Clinton administration was 43 votes shy of the 218 needed for passage if all House members vote.

Passage in the Senate, by contrast, appears to be a lock.

In the Senate Finance Committee on Wednesday, debate on the measure amounted to a resounding bipartisan chorus of approval from senators whose pro-trade views have been overshadowed by the struggle in the House.

One after another, a series of influential senators--including William V. Roth Jr. (R-Del.), Daniel Patrick Moynihan (D-N.Y.), Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah) and Max Baucus (D-Mont.)--said that the vote on the trade bill would be the most important in the 106th Congress. Roth called it “a defining moment in our relationship with China.”

Only Sen. James M. Jeffords (R-Vt.) opposed the measure, contending that Congress should not cede its annual chance to protest human rights abuses in China. Even Sen. Fred Thompson (R-Tenn.), who has been sharply critical of China’s record on proliferation of nuclear weapons, missile technology and other armaments, voted to send the measure to the floor.

The other two Democrats who voted against the measure in Ways and Means are Reps. William J. Coyne of Pennsylvania and John Lewis of Georgia.

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Times staff writer James Gerstanzang contributed to this story.