[Congressional Bills 119th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 1286 Introduced in House (IH)]
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119th CONGRESS
2d Session
H. RES. 1286
Calling for a trade policy that supports workers, consumers,
independent farmers, small businesses, and the environment.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
May 14, 2026
Ms. DeLauro (for herself, Mrs. Dingell, Mr. Lynch, Mr. Deluzio, Mr.
Khanna, Ms. Hoyle of Oregon, Ms. Waters, Mr. Riley of New York, Mr.
Mrvan, Mr. Norcross, Mr. Boyle of Pennsylvania, Ms. Kaptur, Mr. Pocan,
Ms. Schakowsky, Ms. Velazquez, Ms. Budzinski, Mr. Cleaver, Ms. Balint,
Mrs. Grijalva, Mr. McGovern, Mr. Thompson of Mississippi, Ms. Ocasio-
Cortez, Ms. Scanlon, Mr. Casar, Mr. Tonko, Mr. Scott of Virginia, Ms.
Stevens, Mr. Morelle, and Mr. Garcia of Illinois) submitted the
following resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Ways and
Means
_______________________________________________________________________
RESOLUTION
Calling for a trade policy that supports workers, consumers,
independent farmers, small businesses, and the environment.
Whereas, for decades, United States trade policy has put corporate interests
first, benefiting wealthy individuals and large corporations at the
expense of working families, communities, independent farmers, small
businesses, the environment, and the national and economic security of
the United States;
Whereas, since 1994, the United States has seen--
(1) the closure of over 70,000 factories;
(2) the loss of millions of manufacturing jobs, including millions of
good, union jobs;
(3) the decimation of more than 300,000 family farmers;
(4) the hollowing out of communities across the Nation; and
(5) threats to collective safety created by United States reliance on
farflung supply chains;
Whereas corporate-centered trade policy has undeniably failed the American
people, and under trade agreements like the United States-Mexico-Canada
Agreement, layoffs, plant closures, and offshoring persist;
Whereas, in response to the justified anger of so many Americans hurt by this
bankrupt trade model, President Trump campaigned on a promise to
leverage trade policy to reverse these failures; and
Whereas, instead of keeping this promise, President Trump has used the erratic
imposition and removal of tariffs to cut backroom deals to enrich his
friends and family, not American workers, and eliminated billions of
dollars of investments in domestic energy and manufacturing, as
companies continue to close factories and lay off workers to pad profits
by chasing low wages overseas: Now, therefore, be it
Resolved, That--
(1) the House of Representatives rejects the choice between
President Trump's chaotic, corrupt, corporate-captured trade
policies and a return to the devastating trade model of the
past;
(2) the House of Representatives supports a trade policy
that unflaggingly centers workers, supports family farmers and
consumers, promotes a healthy environment, and enhances
national well-being, resilience, and security; and
(3) it is the sense of the House of Representatives that--
(A) to eliminate major incentives for companies to
offshore jobs, any trade agreement must include strong,
binding labor and environmental standards and rules of
origin backed by swift and certain enforcement
mechanisms;
(B) trade agreements must include effective tools
for challenging violations, including at the facility
level, and businesses and governments must be held
accountable when they fail to uphold workers' rights
and environmental protections;
(C) trade agreements must also include fair wage
guarantees across manufacturing, food processing, call
centers, back-office, and other tradeable sectors to
disincentivize offshoring;
(D) robust development assistance funding,
including the grant program administered by the
Department of Labor's International Labor Affairs
Bureau, should ensure that strong labor provisions
level the playing field by improving respect for
workers' rights;
(E) corporations seeking preferential tariff
treatment must be required to meet a wage floor; and
(F) trade should raise wages and standards
globally, not allow companies to seek out low-wage
labor markets with weak workers' rights and
environmental protections, pitting workers against each
other in a never-ending race to the bottom;
(4) it is the sense of the House of Representatives that--
(A) public procurement and infrastructure
investment should support United States workers;
(B) trade agreements must in no way undermine
governments' ability to--
(i) preference the purchase of domestic
products at the Federal or State level; or
(ii) include labor, environmental, and
other standards in their purchasing
preferences;
(C) domestically, Buy America requirements must be
strengthened to ensure goods are truly made in the
United States, not minimally assembled or routed
through loopholes;
(D) rules must be strengthened to ensure that
products, such as steel and aluminum, are melted,
poured, smelted, cast, and fabricated domestically; and
(E) waivers to such requirements and rules should
be limited, and domestic content standards should apply
across infrastructure, energy, and defense spending;
(5) it is the sense of the House of Representatives that--
(A) United States trade and tax policy must stop
incentivizing companies to move production overseas
and, instead, should penalize them for doing so;
(B) United States trade agreements must include
mechanisms for targeting individual cases of offshoring
and should condition United States market access on the
creation of good American jobs;
(C) Federal contracts, tax incentives, and
financing must prioritize companies that invest and
produce in the United States, and should include
clawbacks and other remedies against companies and
their leaders that offshore jobs or supply chains;
(D) trade should rebuild domestic manufacturing
capacity, not accelerate its decline, and must be
complemented by robust industrial policies to support
union jobs, with similar conditions and remedies to
support workers; and
(E) when trade policies fail to prevent offshoring,
the United States must have an active, accessible, and
fully funded Trade Adjustment Assistance Program to
help workers get back on their feet;
(6) it is the sense of the House of Representatives that--
(A) trade policy must not allow companies to
undercut United States workers by exploiting weaker
standards abroad;
(B) United States trade agreements must include
robust environmental standards, including those to
limit industrial point water, air, climate, and ground
pollution, that are enforced with effective mechanisms
to challenge violations;
(C) industrial espionage, forced technology
transfer, and intellectual property theft conducted to
create unfair advantages over United States producers
must be treated as trade violations and met with strong
enforcement;
(D) United States trade and investment agreements
must exclude the investor-state dispute settlement
system that incentivizes offshoring and threatens
environmental, labor, and other public policies by
granting special rights to transnational corporations;
and
(E) trade should reward responsible production, not
a race to the bottom;
(7) it is the sense of the House of Representatives that--
(A) trade agreements should prioritize access to
affordable medicine at home and abroad;
(B) trade policy must not constrain governments'
ability to adopt policies that enable the domestic
production of medicine to address public health needs
and to negotiate with companies for lower prescription
drug prices; and
(C) United States trade agreements should not
provide monopoly protections that enable pharmaceutical
firms to raise drug prices;
(8) it is the sense of the House of Representatives that--
(A) trade must prioritize benefits for independent
and family farmers and rural communities, including
through--
(i) mandatory country-of-origin labeling
rules to ensure market transparency;
(ii) disciplines on subsidies that exclude
large producers and processors but permit
targeted support for small-, mid-, and family-
scale farmers; and
(iii) antimonopoly disciplines to promote
fair input prices and farm gate prices; and
(B) trade agreements must also recognize countries'
sovereignty to set their own food safety standards and
related inspection standards;
(9) it is the sense of the House of Representatives that--
(A) much of the digital economy, including the
training of ``artificial intelligence'', is being built
on the backs of exploited workers overseas and without
regard to its multiple impacts here at home;
(B) trade agreements not only need robust worker's
rights protections for the digital economy, but must in
no way constrain countries' ability to set and enforce
policy with respect to--
(i) data privacy, security, and storage;
(ii) right-to-repair policies;
(iii) regulation of artificial
intelligence;
(iv) protection against online
discrimination and other civil rights
violations;
(v) competition in the marketplace; and
(vi) related issues; and
(C) trade policy must also provide protections for
the copyrighted work of the more than 5,000,000 people
who work in the motion picture, television, and music
industries;
(10) it is the sense of the House of Representatives that--
(A) trade policies should not privilege
corporations, whether through provisions included in
trade agreements, special access to policymakers, or
privileged positions in tariff and waiver discussions;
(B) the priorities of working families should be
front and center in transparent negotiations, including
when decisions are being made about food safety,
environmental, health, privacy, labor, worker safety,
and other standards; and
(C) Congress must vote to approve any new or
renegotiated trade or investment agreement that
includes binding terms that change any existing or
constrain any future United States policies;
(11) it is the sense of the House of Representatives that--
(A) tariffs are a critical tool to counter unfair
trade and corporate greed and to strengthen strategic
sectors;
(B) the United States must maintain and strengthen
tariffs under section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of
1962 (19 U.S.C. 1862) and section 301 of the Trade Act
of 1974 (19 U.S.C. 2411) where they support domestic
production and good-paying jobs;
(C) when an Administration fails to maintain and
strengthen such tariffs to support American industry
and workers, Congress will exercise its constitutional
trade authority to address specific abuses;
(D) such tariffs should not be weakened or removed
if doing so exposes workers to import surges or trade
cheating; and
(E) Congress opposes giving corporations and bad
actors overseas a free pass; and
(12) it is the sense of the House of Representatives that--
(A) the United States must fully enforce its trade
laws to stop other unfair practices, such as dumping
and government-subsidized products on the United States
market, to undercut United States producers;
(B) antidumping and countervailing duty laws must
be applied robustly and without delay;
(C) existing trade preference programs must be
updated to close loopholes that allow companies to
evade duties; and
(D) enforcement agencies must be fully funded so
they can act quickly and effectively to catch and
prevent abuses.
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