Stop a surprise November approval of CAFTA! Say No to CAFTA now!

CAFTA supporters are preparing a "November Surprise"

Join Central Americans in Mobilizing to Stop Post-Election Vote in US Congress!

[information for this alert comes from CISPES, Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador]
Posted October 23, 2004

On October 12, tens of thousands of Central Americans took to the streets to protest the US-Dominican Republic-Central American Free Trade Agreement (DR-CAFTA). In El Salvador, protesters shut down highways and bridges, marched to the presidential palace, and held rallies around the capital. Meanwhile, large demonstrations took place in Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Nicaragua, with all demanding NO to CAFTA! U.S. citizens, in solidarity with the Central Americans, also protested outside the office of Trade Representative Zoellick. But despite such resistance, many Republicans and their corporate backers are pushing for a November vote on CAFTA. They must be stopped!

Lacking the support in the regular Congress to pass CAFTA, Bush and the Republicans are intent on using dirty tricks to ram through the extremely unpopular legislation. The special "lame duck" session would happen in mid-November. Free trade backers have used the lame duck session to pass controversial trade laws in the past, and are intent to pass CAFTA as soon as possible. In response, the Stop CAFTA Coalition presented a letter signed by over 160 organizations to all members of Congress, while holding a press conference on October 7 to denounce efforts to pass CAFTA in a lame duck session.

A lame duck CAFTA vote is most likely if Bush wins. In such a special session, the announcement of a vote could happen within 48 hours of the vote itself, meaning that we must start preparing now for emergency mobilizations in November. A lame duck vote would be less likely if Kerry wins, but the battle over CAFTA will be far from over. Our allies in the global south go beyond Kerry's superficial critique of the environmental and labor clauses in CAFTA by rejecting the entire model. Join Central Americans and Dominicans resisting CAFTA by mobilizing to stop a November lame duck vote in Congress!

TAKE ACTION!

1. Start mobilizing to stop a lame-duck CAFTA vote. Call your Congressional Representative at 202-224-3121 and tell them to vote NO on CAFTA whenever it comes up for a vote. Prepare to mobilize protests against CAFTA fence-sitters in your area, and to flood them with phone calls in November should CAFTA come up for a vote.

2. Ask organizations to sign-on to the letter calling for the rejection of CAFTA. To view the letter, go to www.cispes.org/cafta . To sign on, go to http://stopcafta.org/modinput.php?modin=2 or send an email tomr@quixote.org.

For more information on the Stop CAFTA Coalition, see: www.stopcafta.org