On the eve of President Biden hosting the first Americas Partnership for Economic Prosperity leaders summit, lawmakers urged the Administration to eliminate investor-state dispute settlement from existing US trade and investment agreements.
The APEP regional framework provides an opportunity to remove ISDS from existing trade agreements with Central and Latin American countries.
“We urge you to pursue any and all options at your disposal – including new regional frameworks like the Americans Partnership for Economic Prosperity (APEP), which your agencies are spearheading – to remove ISDS from existing US trade deals,” the lawmakers wrote in a letter to
US Trade Representative Katherine Tai and Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass) and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) and Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn) led over 35 lawmakers in sending the letter.
“We are glad that the Biden administration opposes ISDS and remains committed not to include ISDS provisions in future trade deals,” the wrote. “Yet many of the United States’ existing free trade agreements still contain ISDS provisions that foreign corporations... continue to exploit,” wrote the lawmakers. “As your agencies move to negotiate the Americas Partnership for Economic Prosperity, you have an unprecedented opportunity to remove ISDS from existing US trade agreements in the Western Hemisphere, and we urge you to pursue this and any other opportunity to do so.”
“The ISDS system allows large corporations to hold the US government and our trading partners hostage, demanding billions of dollars unless they are allowed to move forward with projects like the Keystone XL pipeline that would undermine tribal sovereignty, harm Native communities, and
devastate the environment,” they continued.
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