COVINGTON — Kentucky labor leaders are putting pressure on U.S. Rep. Ken Lucas to vote against federal legislation granting the president more authority to negotiate foreign trade agreements.

        Union leaders say they fear the so-called “fast track” legislation will cost Americans jobs, hurt the environment and lower the standards of products purchased by consumers.

Lucas

        “We want Lucas to get off the fast track and get on the right track,” Bill Londrigan, president of the Kentucky AFL-CIO, said during a Wednesday morning press conference in Covington attended by about a dozen area labor leaders and members.

        “And the right track is for fair trade, not free trade,” Mr. Londrigan said. “Fast track is the wrong track because it gives too much authority to the president, any president, to negotiate trade without real congressional oversight or input.”

        Congress has denied the “trade-promotion” or “fast track” authority to the White House since 1994. House Republicans are trying to change that, with a bill that would enable Mr. Bush to forge trade accords Congress would have to accept or reject without modification.

        Officials in the Bush administration have said the president should get authority to forge trade agreements not subject to congressional amendment because it will lead to increased agricultural exports and better protection of markets from foreign competitors.

        Democrats, backed by labor supporters, are gearing up to fight the Republican version of the legislation.

        Mr. Lucas, a Boone County Democrat who represents Kentucky's 4th Congressional District, has not said how he will vote on the bill, which could come up for a vote next week.

        To try to sway Mr. Lucas, state and local labor leaders — who have backed Mr. Lucas in his past elections — are running television and radio ads asking people to call the congressman's office and ask him to vote no on the fast-track bill.

        The ads began running Wednesday in Cincinnati and Charleston, W.Va., which serves the eastern portion of the 22-county 4th District, including Ashland.

        Neither Mr. Londrigan nor Wayne Whalen, president of the Northern Kentucky Labor Council, which encompasses several area unions and represents about 30,000 workers, had information on how much the unions are spending on the media campaign.

        “We are calling on the people of the 4th Congressional District to call Congressman Lucas at 1-800-393-1082 and tell him to vote no on fast track,” Mr. Londrigan said.

        The ads are being run in 20 other congressional districts around the country, but none in Kentucky other than in Mr. Lucas' district.

        Opponents of fast track say the legislation will give foreign companies an unfair advantage over American companies. The foreign companies can produce goods cheaper in their countries and then sell them here at lower prices.

        That will lead to the loss of jobs in America, Mr. Whalen said.

        Former steelworker and union member Butch Halloway, 49, of Silver Grove said he and nearly 300 steelworkers lost their jobs at Newport Steel in Wilder earlier this year because of foreign companies “dumping” steel in the U.S.

        Companies in China and Brazil can make steel for $220 a ton. It was costing Newport Steel $285 a ton, Mr. Halloway said.

        In March NS Group, the parent company of Newport Steel, announced that it would cease steel production at the plant on the banks of the Licking River and concentrate on piping for the oil industry, resulting in the loss of 280 jobs.

        “They had no need for me after that,” said Mr. Halloway, who worked for the company for nearly 30 years and now collects unemployment benefits.

        “This type of trading, which could increase under this fast track, has got to stop,” he said.

        NS Group President and CEO Rene Robichaud confirmed that cheaper foreign steel played a major role in Mr. Halloway and his fellow workers losing their jobs.

        “Butch is absolutely right,” he said. “NS Group needed to stay competitive and we needed to shut down our steel making capabilities in Northern Kentucky.”

        Mr. Robichaud, however, said he does not necessarily disapprove of fast-track legislation because it opens foreign markets to American products.

        But there needs to be more oversight of what he called “illegal dumping” of steel, when foreign companies, often with subsidies from their governments, purposely undercut American firms with lower prices.

        It is illegal, he said, when a company sells a steel product at a price well below market value of domestic products or below the cost it takes to manufacture.

        “That is probably saving jobs in China but it cost Butch Halloway his job in Northern Kentucky,” Mr. Robichaud said.

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