IFPTE Applauds AFL-CIO Letter to Congress on Union Priorities on Trade Policy and Tariffs

This week, the AFL-CIO sent a letter reminding Congress of labor’s positions and priorities on promoting a worker-centered trade policy, one that includes key IFPTE priorities. The AFL-CIO letter includes strong support for Senate-passed Senate Joint Resolution 37, which would terminate the national emergency declared to impose tariffs on imports from Canada. It also requests support for replacing the Trump Administration’s poorly designed and implemented tariffs with strategic tariffs and policies that support American workers and domestic industries, and it also calls on Congress to support using Federal Trade Commission authorities to stop corporations from price gouging.

The letter makes clear that the alternative to “the Trump Administration's reckless, on-again, off-again approach” is not to embrace failed the free trade policies that resulted in lowering labor and environmental standards and drove manufacturing and critical supply chains out of the U.S. economy. Instead, the AFL-CIO urges Congress not to eliminate enforcement tools that undermine fair trade enforcement tools that can stop nations with lower wage and labor standards, lower environmental standards, and unfair practices from using trade to displace critical supply chains and manufacturing capacity in the U.S.

The letter concludes with a strong statement of labor-backed policies, which are aligned with IFPTE’s principles on trade.

Read the AFL-CIO’s letter to Members of the House of Representatives here.

Read IFPTE’s 2025 issue brief, “Forging a Trade Framework that Works for Working People, Our Communities, and the Public Interest”