GOP: Stop dawdling on trade agreements

• Tweet

WASHINGTON, June 18 (UPI) -- The Obama administration needs to expedite international trade agreements to ease unemployment, U.S. Sen. John Hoeven, R-N.D., said Saturday.

In the Republican Party's weekly radio and Internet address, the senator said trade agreements with Colombia, Panama and South Korea were being delayed by Democrats' policy.

Of those, Hoeven focused on South Korea, which he said was waiting for Washington to formalize a trade agreement that would eliminate many tariffs.

"The South Korean Free Trade Agreement alone will increase our nation's exports to that country by more than $10 billion and create 280,000 American jobs," he said. "Free and fair trade agreements can help us create the kind of pro-jobs, pro-growth economy that will lift our nation up."

Hoeven said with nearly 14 million citizens without jobs and a $14 trillion national debt, the remedy was to increase trade and the resultant creation of jobs.

"All of these agreements have been languishing for years, but with a 9.1 percent unemployment rate, and a spiraling deficit, the president can no longer hold these agreements back," Hoeven said.