Sens. Bill Nelson and Marco Rubio both voted in favor of the trade agreements. Florida Democrats in the House of Representatives were split, with Corrine Brown, Alcee Hastings and Ted Deutch voting against the agreements and Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Kathy Castor voting to support the approval of the agreements. Florida GOP House members voted to approve the trade agreements.

Gov. Rick Scott said in a statement issued Wednesday that “free trade with Panama and Colombia will benefit Florida’s economy and businesses for years to come. By eliminating the need to pay tariffs in order to export Florida goods and products to those expanding economies, Florida companies will now be able to invest their money in creating jobs.”

Marco Rubio said in a video statement he is “very encouraged by the fact that we finally passed the free trade agreement,” adding that the agreements “will have huge positive benefits for Florida especially the free trade agreements with Colombia and Panama will create thousands of jobs in Florida”:

The Miami Herald reports today that ”the Florida Chamber of Commerce says the agreements will create more than 20,000 new jobs and generate more than $1.5 billion in international trade opportunities.”

The Herald adds: “Not only will Florida products, such as citrus and beef, become more competitive but the state will potentially benefit from an increase in the billions of dollars worth of imports and exports that move to the three markets through Florida ports and airports.”

Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos (Pic by World Economic Forum, via Flickr)

Opponents continue to point to potential American job losses and violence against Colombian union members, which has claimed 2,908 lives over the last 25 years. Since August 2010, when current President Juan Manuel Santos took office, at least 40 union members have been killed — 22 this year and 16 of those murders after April, when a Labor Action Plan to deal with this violence was included in the trade agreement.

In a column explaining why he opposed the trade agreements, Deutch wrote, “In the midst of unprecedented long-term unemployment, I cannot support trade agreements that repeat the mistakes of previous trade deals that shipped millions of American jobs overseas and exploded our national trade deficit.”

Deutch added: “These proposed pacts will only escalate the global race for cheap labor in nations with poor human rights records. The Colombia deal will increase the availability of cheap labor with historically poor worker protections.”

The U.S. Senate Committee on Finance will hold hearings today to consider bills to implement three free trade agreements, including the U.S.-Colombia Trade Promotion Agreement, mired in controversy since its proposal under the Bush administration.

President Obama sent the trade agreements with Colombia, South Korea and Panama to Congress last week, and by Wednesday the House Ways and Means committee had approved the agreement, opening the path to a vote in the full House possibly this week.

Enterprise Florida, a supporter of the free trade agreements, has argued (.pdf):

• “US exports to Colombia would grow by 13.7%, an increase of some US$1.1 billion over 2005 levels.”
• “Due to implementation of the US-Colombia TPA, exports of Florida- origin goods to Colombia increase by the same percentage (13.7%) over 2010.”
• “Using standard US Department of Commerce ‘rule of thumb’ estimates (11,000 US jobs per each additional US$1 billion in US exports of goods), the increased exports of Florida-origin goods to Colombia made possible by implementing this trade deal would annually support an additional 3,800 jobs in Florida. Meanwhile, Florida’s increased services exports to Colombia could sustain an additional 2,614 jobs all over the state. Therefore, in total the TPA is likely to result in the addition of over 6,400 jobs for Floridians.”

Andres Felipe Sanchez of the Colombian labor organization Escuela Nacional Sindical tells The Florida Independent that Colombian government officials, like those at the office of the agricultural ministry, have said the South American country is not ready for a free trade agreement due to a lack of infrastructure, even roads.

Sanchez agrees that “the Colombian government has taken positive steps to implement measures in a Labor Action Plan included in the U.S. Colombia Free Trade Agreement,” but with more than 2 million subcontracted workers via third parties, labor violations continue. Sanchez says that in the past, multinational companies have not respected the basic rights of Colombian workers.

A recent report issued by the Escuela Nacional Sindical states that overall the Action Plan has not “transformed labor policies” and so far has “had a minimal effect on the country’s labor relations.”

Another contentious issue related to the Colombian Free Trade agreement is the killing of Colombian union members. Sanchez tells the Independent that since 1986 violence against union members has claimed 2,908 lives. Since August 2010, when current President Juan Manuel Santos took office, at least 40 union members have been killed — 22 this year and 16 of those murders after April, when the Labor Action Plan was signed.

Sanchez says that “legislative measures will not transform anti-union violence in Colombia; this will not happen in six months.”

American opponents of the free trade agreements include organized labor, human rights advocates and research centers, which have pointed out that the free trade agreement model has meant a loss of U.S. jobs in the past.

The Economic Policy Institute writes that free trade agreements “have benefitted the world’s largest corporations at the expense of the average worker, and shown how the winners and losers of trade agreements line up not along national borders, but according to their economic status.”

The Policy Institute argues that the South Korean agreement “will increase the U.S. trade deficit with Korea by about $16.7 billion, and displace about 159,000 American jobs within the first seven years after it takes effect.”

Rep. Dave Camp, R-Mich., chairman of the House Ways and Means committee, issued the following statement last week following the vote that passed U.S. free trade agreements with Colombia, Panama and South Korea:

Today has been five years in the making and could not come at a better time for American workers, consumers and businesses. The agreements with Colombia, Panama and South Korea will help create and support 250,000 American jobs and add over $10 billion to our gross domestic product – all without adding one dime in new government spending.

Clinton’s comparison signaled to some that the U.S. wants to step up its involvement in Mexico, fighting the country’s drug cartels like it did in Colombia. But Mexican politicians aren’t so sure the comparison between the two fights is accurate, The Christian Science Monitor reported today:

Mexico’s security spokesman Alejandro Poire acknowledged that there are “some similarities” to Colombia. But Mr. Poire also said “there’s a big difference between what Colombia faced back then and what we are facing right now,” Euronews reported. He added that America’s demand for illegal drugs is the root cause of Mexico’s problems. He also pointed to US guns trafficked to Mexican drug cartels as a serious concern. [...]

Among Mexican officials, there are serious concerns that Clinton’s remarks may be trying to lay the foundation for a US intervention in Mexico not unlike Plan Colombia. Under that anti-drug program, the US sent military forces to work with the Colombian army to break up drug cartels. The program has cost the US $7 billion and is widely controversial in Latin America.

“Whoever thinks Colombia is a cure-all, and if the United States thinks it is necessary to apply the same model to us they applied to  Colombia, they are mistaken,” Mexican Senator Ricardo Monreal was quoted saying in the Guardian. He added that US assistance to Colombia had not brought an end to the drug trade there.

The Mexican politicians are right: Colombia still has a problem with the drug trade. But experts argue Colombia can be used as a guide for how to combat the drug trade by stemming the flow of money to drug lords.

In an interview last month, Bob Killebrew, a fellow at the Center for a New American Security, called Colombia’s fight against the drug trade “the only success story in the Western Hemisphere right now.” He says the Colombian model, though imperfect, should be exported to other countries to show how to stop drug cartels by cutting off their resources and taking out leaders.

Countries ranked less likely to default include corruptocracy Kazakhstan, less-than-reform-minded Indonesia, the debt-ridden Philippines and violence-ridden Colombia. By comparison, U.S. Treasuries prices are up today despite a new issuance this week.

With a tone that bordered on mocking, McCain disparaged Sen. Barack Obama’s opposition to the agreement. From the transcript:

But let me give you another example of a free trade agreement that Sen. Obama opposes. Right now, because of previous agreements, some made by President Clinton, the goods and products that we send to Colombia , which is our largest agricultural importer of our products, is — there’s a billion dollars that we — our businesses have paid so far in order to get our goods in there.

Because of previous agreements, their goods and products come into our country for free.  So Sen. Obama, who has never traveled south of our border, opposes the Colombia Free Trade Agreement. The same country that’s helping us try to stop the flow of drugs into our country that’s killing young Americans.

And also the country that just freed three Americans that will help us create jobs in America because they will be a market for our goods and products without having to pay — without us having to pay the billions of dollars — the billion dollars and more that we’ve already paid.

Free trade with Colombia is something that’s a no-brainer. But maybe you ought to travel down there and visit them and maybe you could understand it a lot better.

Obama cited the Colombian government’s spotty human rights record and its blind eye toward  the assassination of labor leaders as reasons for his opposition.

Human Rights Watch issued a 142-page report today on Colombia’s efforts to rein in paramilitary groups. It concluded that the trade agreement has been an effective carrot for encouraging Colombian President Alvaro Uribe to crack down on the paramilitary “mafias” that engage in drug trafficking and murder opponents, including trade unionists.

A proposal that President Uribe floated in 2007 to allow politicians who collaborated with paramilitaries to avoid prison altogether would have had a devastating impact on the investigations. Fortunately, President Uribe tabled this proposal after it became evident that it would become an obstacle to the ratification of the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement. It is unclear what would happen if the pressure related to ratification of the trade deal were dropped.

The human rights organization appears to side with Obama on whether the agreement should be ratified in the near future, recommending that the U.S. Congress “[c]ontinue to delay ratification of the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement until Colombia shows concrete and sustained results in reducing impunity for trade unionist killings and dismantling the paramilitary mafias responsible for many of the killings. This means that Colombia must show meaningful results in investigating and holding accountable not only paramilitary leaders but also their many accomplices.”

Clearly, McCain’s comments last night demonstrated a willingness to overlook the potential human cost of his ideological pursuit of unrestricted trade.