McCain not worried about trade politics

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) will not backtrack from his support for free trade to win votes in a general election against either of his likely Democratic opponents, a senior adviser to his campaign said Thursday.

“He’s not going to play election-year politics on the big issues,” said former Congressional Budget Office Director Doug Holtz-Eakin, a senior policy adviser to McCain, who spoke to The Hill after a panel discussion on trade that also included advisers to both Democratic presidential candidates.

{mosads}Holtz-Eakin said McCain is not worried about losing votes to his Democratic opponent in battleground states such as Michigan or Ohio, where free trade agreements are blamed for the loss of manufacturing jobs.

He went on to blame bad local government policies for Michigan’s troubled economy, criticizing those who want to demagogue on trade as the problem. He suggested voters would come to the same conclusion this fall.

After the event, Gary Gensler, a senior adviser to Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton’s (D) presidential campaign, suggested the New York senator would welcome the chance to contrast her positions on trade policy with those of McCain. “I think she is very much looking forward to having that debate with Sen. McCain,” Gensler said.

McCain’s trade positions sharply contrasted with the policies of Clinton and Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), something highlighted by the advisers.

McCain supports trade agreements negotiated by the Bush administration with Colombia, South Korea and Panama, which the two Democrats both oppose, according to their advisers. Holtz-Eakin said McCain also opposes renegotiating the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), something Obama and Clinton have pledged to do.

“He is determined to revisit all calls for protectionism in the U.S.,” Holtz-Eakin said during the discussion.

It is not clear what impact trade might have in the presidential election. In 2004, President Bush narrowly defeated Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) in Ohio, despite Kerry’s criticism of Bush’s trade policies. If Kerry had won Ohio, he would have won the presidency.

Trade played a huge role in this year’s Ohio primary fight, in which Clinton handily defeated Obama and thereby appeared to revive her campaign.

In the days leading up to the contest, Obama found himself on the defensive after an economic aide acknowledged meeting with Canadian officials about NAFTA. An internal Canadian government memo on the meeting said the Obama aide suggested an Obama administration would not look to unravel NAFTA, despite the campaign rhetoric.