Barack Obama Quotes

I'm a big free trader. But it has to be fair.

I think that trade is an important issue. Of course, we are 5 percent of the world's population; we have to trade with the other 95 percent. And we need to have smart, fair trade deals.

And as secretary of state, I fought hard for American businesses to get a fair shot around the world and to stop underhanded trading practices like currency manipulation and the theft of intellectual property.

In May 2007, congressional Democrats and the Bush administration agreed to a plan to include environmental and international labor standards in upcoming trade agreements.

We want free trade but we want free trade that is good. We want free trade that levels the playing field.

I think that they are hung up on, you know, that people cheat and we don't enforce the laws, and I think that's correct. But I don't think people want to just say, "We're not going to trade with anybody."

I do think we need to hold countries accountable who violate trade agreements that are already in place. We need to get stronger about enforcement, that in the future if we strike a trade agreement, toughening up labor standards and environmental standards and enforcement standards is something we absolutely need to do.

I am more interested in fair and balanced trade between nations than I am in free trade that encumbers us in a multinational pact that is refereed by the WTO.

We think it is possible to get the benefits of a customs union but still have the flexibility for the U.K. to pursue an independent trade policy on top of that with other countries outside the E.U.

What Donald Trump has been concerned about, what he's talked about, is when we get deals that don't level the playing field, when we get deals that aren't the kinds of best deals we can get, we want good deals, and those are free trade deals to lower the barriers between trade between two countries.

I want a trade that is not trickle-down trade, but trade that recognizes we're in a global economy.

I absolutely trust Hillary Clinton to stand strong on trade agreements.

Going on and getting good bilateral agreement is a better way [than Trans-Pacific Partnership agreements], and I'm fine with that strategy. I think that strategy can work as well.

Brexit has shrunk the market opportunities. Exiting trade deals will do the same for the U.S. Those deals must be actively shaped and governed to make growth more inclusive.

Clinton is someone who understands trade, who understands we want more of it, but we want it under a different set of rules.

Tariffs are in the end taxes. And somebody has to pay that tax. I think one thing people are forgetting is that trade disputes are two-sided. When the United States imposes tariffs on a partner like Canada, there is always a possibility that Canada will say that's not fair and retaliate. And at that point, you have to ask the question, - which U.S. industry will suffer because the Canadians retaliated against it?

I am very glad, Anderson, that secretary Clinton discovered religion on this issue but it's a little bit too late. Secretary Clinton supported virtually every one of the disastrous trade agreements written by corporate America.

I'm pro-trade, but I'm pro-sensible trade, not pro-trade that is to the disadvantage of the American worker.

We're working on accession to the WTO very actively. We still have several countries with which we need to conclude agreements and possibly that will happen next year.

Canada and the United States are also working at the World Trade Organization and in our own hemisphere with negotiations for a Trade Area of the Americas to try to help countries create a positive climate for investment and trade.

The Clinton administration brought 65 cases from 1995 to 2000 before the World Trade Organization. The Bush administration has brought twelve. Twelve cases. They haven't even been able to stand up for our jobs.

Before we move forward with new efforts to lower the barriers to international free trade, we must review the consequences of the policies of the past and address the problems of the present.

President Obama was right to make enforcement of those trade rules a priority and his creation, today, of a Trade Enforcement Unit is a massive step in the right direction.

I have long been a vocal advocate of reciprocal free trade though that position did not endear me to my own political party. And I continue to strongly believe in free and fair international trade.

You can’t have free trade of others don’t play by the same set of rules that our guys play by…. Free trade works if we open our markets and they open theirs.