In fact, I have had a problem with Bernie's genuine rejection of all trade pacts and Hillary's likely political rejection of them. There were problems with many early trade pacts in that they did nothing to try to raise the level of workers' rights or environmental standards elsewhere -- as they could.
However, I think that almost all of the things that people here - including Bernie -- attribute to trade pacts is really due to globalization becoming easier and easier. In a way, that upsets the balance between employers and employees. If you look over time, there have been swings in the level of power each side had. At the point of the industrial revolution, thousands left the country side - many forced out - providing huge pools of potential laborers for the new industries. More workers than needed - so it was easy for employers to keep wages down. Unions were the antidote because they couldn't (usually) replace all of them. In the US, there were times when legislation strengthened and when legislation weakened the power of unions.
When Bernie spoke of the trade deals harming people in Michigan, he ignored that long before any trade deals, Michigan lost a huge number of jobs that fled to the non union Southern states. After that, still before the trade deals, manufacturing jobs fled to countries with cheap labor. If the cost of shipping back the product and any extra costs doing the manufacturing remotely and any tariffs were sufficiently lower than the extra wages and costs to produce here, businesses could and did chose to move jobs. (Here, using the tax code to give breaks to companies operating in the US could, if the gap was small enough, save the jobs.)
The company that my husband worked for produced women's dresses, manufactured in many countries including Sri Lanka. When our daughter studied there in her semester abroad we visited her and we were invited by the company to tour it when there. The US had no trade pact with Sri Lanka, but the wages - reasonable for Sri Lanka allowed them to produce dresses far more cheaply than could be done in the US. One interesting thing was as you entered the large airy room where things were made, there was a prominent sign that included a list of commitments to workers that company made that was required by many US companies before they would sign contracts with them. We were told this came about because of consumers who demanded those commitments. Even if every trade pact was overturned, there is no reason to think that many jobs will return. None of the main competitors to this company produce dresses in the US.
In fact, it likely is that world trade itself - including the trade pacts - can be a force for improving standards in the other countries.
At this point, I do not know who to believe on whether the current agreements improve the status quo, change nothing, or make things worse. It is true that more recent trade agreements have workers rights and environmental provisions that NAFTA and CAFTA do not. Both Obama and Kerry are making the case that they are helpful, but others like Warren, who I also trust, are saying that they actually are harmful. I hope that there are open hearings to really hear what the agreements entail. Until then, I will be uncomfortable when Bernie rants against them on principle and when HRC suggests she was always against them. I honestly do not know which is worse - an honest, but maybe naive rejection or a politically motivated finger in the wind rejection of what really was - until it was clear that it was toxic in a Democratic primary - her biggest accomplishment as Secretary of State.
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