mr. speaker , i thank the gentleman for yielding to me . 
mr. speaker , earlier this evening we heard an hour debate of why congress and the american people should support cafta . 
and to the gentleman from michigan ( mr. levin ) xz4002380 i would like to say , as paul harvey would say , now the rest of the story . 
i want to thank my good friend , the gentleman from michigan ( mr. levin ) xz4002380 , a distinguished member of the committee on ways and means . 
he has been a remarkable advocate for issues affecting working families . 
this week the house is expected to vote on a trade agreement that only promises job losses and devastation . 
mr. speaker , i rise tonight in strong opposition to cafta . 
i rise tonight for all mainers who have lost their jobs . 
i rise for all working americans and their families , many who are still working at this late hour to help make ends meet . 
and i know what it is like myself . 
for almost 30 years i worked at great northern paper company in east millinocket , maine , where my father worked for 43 years , my grandfather before him for 40 years . 
and that is the way it is in a lot of mill towns in maine and all across the country . 
two days after i was sworn in as a member of congress in january of 2003 , i learned that the mill where i worked filed bankruptcy and was shutting its doors . 
the mill was closed largely due to the pressure created by unfair trade agreements , years of poorly thought-out trade deals that placed manufacturing industries at a huge disadvantage . 
and one would only have to look at the huge trade deficits that are continuing to grow ever since nafta went into effect . 
i know firsthand , as many mainers do , that with these layoffs and closures , when these businesses go under because of unfair trade deals , so does the heart and souls of these communities . 
in maine alone , since 1998 and to late 2004 , the federal government had documented 11 , 724 workers who lost their job due to trade . 
although the real undocumented number is much higher , it has been estimated that 24 , 000 mainers have lost their jobs due to nafta alone . 
the number serves to demonstrate yet again what people in maine already know through our own tough experience . 
the economy continues to struggle and our workers see fewer good prospects . 
maine has lost 23 percent of our manufacturing base over the last 3 years alone . 
now , i heard my colleague who supported cafta earlier talk about the unemployment going down . 
well , i can say my first year in congress we had labor market areas in maine whose unemployment rate was over 35 percent . 
and the reason why the number is lower today is not because they have found jobs , it is because this congress , the previous congress , has failed to extend the unemployment benefits , so they are no longer counted as being unemployed . 
they just drop off the list . 
we are sick of watching our jobs get shipped overseas as our workers stand waving good-bye to them . 
it is time to get off the fast track of lost jobs and shattered dreams and on to the right track for fair trade agreements . 
when it comes to cafta , the benefit is pretty hard to find . 
despite having 44 million inhabitants , the cafta nations ' total purchasing power is the same as new haven , connecticut . 
more than 40 percent of the central american workers work for less than $ 2 a day . 
cafta outsources our jobs to cheap labor markets with almost nonexisting environmental or labor standards . 
how could such a bad deal for our workers pass ? 
in recent days , the administration authorized house leadership to secure votes with whatever is at hand , from extra funding , as you heard earlier , for individual members ' districts in the highway projects and energy bill , to the still incomplete appropriations bills . 
members are being asked to trade away their votes for agreements that trade american jobs away . 
this is just unbelievable . 
tomorrow , the house is expected to vote on h.r. 3283 , the so-called united states trade rights enforcement act . 
this bill does nothing to effectively address china 's unfair trade practices and their adverse impact on u.s. workers and manufacturers and the nation 's economy . 
in fact , it makes it harder to stop unfair chinese trade practices . 
but it has a good-sounding title . 
this bill is an effort to sway votes for cafta , giving members a fig leaf to hide behind so they can say they are standing up against unfair trade agreements . 
it is nothing but smoke and mirrors . 
smoke and mirrors . 
two years ago , these tactics worked to pass the deeply flawed medicare bill by one vote . 
leadership held open a 15-minute vote for 3 hours while they twisted arms in order to ensure passage . 
it is expected the same will happen with the cafta vote . 
is this the way the people of the house should be acting ? 
is this in the best interest of our nation ? 
what message does this send the american people and our workforce and our businesses ? 
and why must these votes always happen in the dark of night ? 
it is because while working americans sleep , their jobs are being traded away . 
mr. speaker , all americans who are watching tonight should check for themselves . 
they should pay close attention to what time the cafta vote happens . 
they should ask themselves why under such cover of darkness should we be voting . 
it is said that midnight is the witching hour . 
americans should wonder what kind of witchcraft is being passed on the house floor as we consider cafta in the dead of night . 
the administration may want this deal to pass as quickly as possible before more opposition mounts , but the people who have suffered the most under our trade policies , including many of my neighbors , my coworkers and my family , and many of the good people in maine have earned the right to ask a simple question about what a new trade deal will mean to their families and get some real answers before we move forward . 
one of the things i hear a lot of people say is that large stable companies , like great northern was , where i worked for over 30 years , will never move overseas because it is too costly . 
i can tell my colleagues firsthand that the mill i worked at had six paper machines . 
they uplifted four of them and shipped them overseas . 
the mill in millinocket , the great northern paper company 's other mill , did the same thing . 
it is nothing for large corporations to unbolt their machines and ship them overseas so they can get that cheap labor . 
we heard earlier that in some of these cafta countries labor is less than $ 2 a day . 
that is exploiting workers . 
it is not to benefit the cafta nations . 
it definitely will not benefit the united states of america . 
so i hope members on both sides of the aisle will take a good hard look at this trade policy because we can not sell-out the american workers . 
we can not sell out the american dream that we have . 
we must reverse these trade policies to once again put the united states of america on the path of growth . 
the only way we are going to be a secure country , the only way we are going to be able to be respected among other nations , like we have in the past , is to make sure that we have a strong economy . 
when we look at what happened during world war ii , what made this country the greatest country in the world , with our greatest generation , was the ability for americans back home to work in our manufacturing industry , to work hand in hand . 
but what are we going to do if we continue to ship these jobs overseas ? 
it is going to weaken the united states ' ability to be the number one leader as far as our national defense . 
we must vote this cafta deal down , regardless of what time in the morning it comes up and regardless of how long the leadership holds the vote open . 
we must do what is right , and what is right is fair trade agreements . 
so i thank the gentleman for yielding to me , and i will be with him voting against cafta . 
