With John Kerry leaving the Senate to become Secretary of State, the seat that Kerry held on the Senate Finance Committee will be filled by Senator Bob Casey of Pennsylvania. This is an interesting committee assignment given that the Finance committee oversees all international trade issues in the Senate and that Senator Casey is one of the most protectionist members of Congress today. But there is another reason why Casey’s assignment and his voting record are intriguing for the future of trade policy.
The Cato Institute has been keeping track of Congressional votes affecting trade freedom since 1999. Every member of Congress has a trade vote profile that reveals their support for trade barriers and trade subsidies throughout their career. The database reveals some interesting facts about members of the Finance Committee, swing states, and ideology.
Pennsylvania and Ohio are both states where neither Republicans nor Democrats hold a stable majority, and indeed there is one Republican senator and one Democratic senator from each. All four of those senators are now on the Senate Finance Committee. What’s especially interesting is that the two Democrats—Casey from Pennsylvania and Sherrod Brown from Ohio—are solid Interventionists according to Cato’s trade scoring matrix, while the two Republicans—Pat Toomey from Pennsylvania and Rob Portman from Ohio—can both securely claim the (alas, much-rarer) Free Trader designation.
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