BY JIM KUHNHENN
ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON (AP) — The trade defeat in Congress was an ominous sign in a month of challenges that could help determine President Barack Obama’s standing for the rest of his second term.
Fellow Democrats rebuffed last-minute appeals to rescue his global trade agenda, and the House seriously damaged Obama’s chances of capping his presidency with a groundbreaking economic pact involving Pacific Rim countries.
Obama also is awaiting a Supreme Court decision that could upend his health care law, and he faces a June 30 deadline to conclude an accord that aims to curb Iran’s nuclear ambitions.
Friday’s setback was the result of a complicated legislative strategy that linked passage of trade negotiating powers for the president with a measure that would provide training and assistance to American workers who lost jobs because of trade.
A narrow House majority voted to give the president the right to negotiate deals that Congress can approve or reject, but not change. Then a large majority of Democrats, eager to kill that negotiating power, joined a majority of Republicans to vote against the aid for workers.
The White House drew attention to the close passage of the trade negotiation piece and noted that the legislation had overcome similar difficulties in the Senate.