As the World Trade Organization prepares to turn 30 years old, the United States is ready to trade out. Wisconsin Congressman Tom Tiffany has introduced a bill to officially withdraw the U.S. from the WTO. Tiffany cites the organization's bias toward China for hindering fair trade deals. "American trade policies should be made by American officials who are elected by American voters and accountable to American workers, not dictated by unelected international bureaucrats in Geneva," says Tiffany in a statement to Breitbart.
The WTO was established in 1995 with the U.S. among its founding members, as a means of promoting open trade among the world's largest economies. But critics have long questioned China's status within the organization, with China still listed as a "developing" country despite being a superpower and one of the largest economies on the globe. President Donald Trump, who recently engaged China directly on trade, is also calling out the WTO. "This all started with the World Trade Organization, which was owned and paid for by China," Trump recently told reporters in the Oval Office. "(China) didn't even have to do things, they considered them a nation that was undeveloped."
"They said (China) was a developing nation, well we're a developing nation too if you think about it," he continued. "Look at our inner cities and what has happened, I think we're starting from ground zero there, right? So we're a developing nation, too."
Overall, Trump likened the WTO to the many bad agreements the U.S. has gotten into over the past several decades. "If you can read first grade (level) and you could read these agreements, you'd say these are terrible deals," he said. "I actually used to say, who would allow deals like this to be made for our country?"
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