CWAers Rally to Remove ISDS from NAFTA

As NAFTA negotiations continued this week, CWAers joined Reps. Rosa DeLauro (D-CT), Marcy Kaptur (D-OH), Louise Slaughter (D-NY), Keith Ellison (D-MN), Debbie Dingell (D-MI), David Cicilline (D-RI), Dan Kildee (D-MI), and Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) at a rally in Washington, D.C., to remove ISDS from NAFTA. The new NAFTA looks a lot like the TPP, particularly in that it doesn’t include eliminating the private justice system for multinational corporations called Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS).

ISDS rigs the system by allowing foreign investors and multinationals to challenge local, state, and federal laws before a private panel of corporate lawyers, instead of in a country's court system. The private panel decides if a corporation's "expected future profits" would be harmed by the government action being challenged, and if so, the panel assesses its often multi-million dollars fines against the government. Decisions can't be appealed.

CWAers joined Members of Congress, including Reps. DeLauro (at the podium), Kaptur, Slaughter, Ellison, Dingell, Cicilline, Kildee, and Schakowsky, at a rally to remove ISDS from NAFTA.