The economy isn’t growing, U.S. Sen Dan Sullivan (R-AK) told attendees at a Ripon Society breakfast meeting last week, but returning to the traditional levels of American growth would make many problems facing the nation much easier to solve.
“With the resignation of the Speaker (of the House) and with President Obama getting rolled by our adversaries at the UN, there’s a sense of dismay that things aren’t going so good,” Sullivan said. “But I’ve always been a glass-half-full kind of guy. We’ve got to keep our eye on the long-term more than what may happen tomorrow or next week.
“If you think about our comparative advantages relative to other countries, I think we have aces,” Sullivan said, pointing to America’s global superiority in such areas as education, energy, technology and national defense.
“We don’t always realize it — President Obama plays it like we have deuces. But we have aces.”
The problem, according to Sullivan, is our stagnating economy.
“The economy isn’t growing,” Sullivan said. “It’s the worst recovery in U.S. history. The average GDP growth in the United States from 1790 to 2014 is about 3.7 percent. That’s what’s made us great. You don’t have great universities, you don’t have a great military, you don’t have great manufacturing unless you are growing the economy on a regular basis.
“The average GDP growth under President Obama and his administration is 1.3 percent. This is a huge, huge issue. It’s not debatable. The economy under this administration has stunk. If we start growing again at traditional levels of American growth, so many challenges that we have – whether it’s our national debt or our entitlement programs — become much easier to solve.
“We overregulate almost every aspect of American life and the American economy. We all want clean water and we all want clean air. But come to my state. We have the cleanest water and cleanest air in the world. And it’s not because of the EPA. It’s because we care about it as Alaskans. But we also care about jobs.”
To combat overregulation, Sullivan, who previously served as Alaska’s Attorney General and commissioner of the state’s Department of Natural Resources before being elected to the Senate in November, introduced legislation called the RED (Regulations Endanger Democracy) Act. The RED Act would require the removal of one regulation from the Federal Register for every new regulation promulgated. If such an offset is refused by the head of an agency, cost of living adjustments would be withheld until the law is abided by.
Sullivan, however, added that such a monumental task can’t be achieved alone.
“One of my first amendments dealt with the fishing industry,” Sullivan said. “I like to call Alaska the ‘Superpower of Seafood.’ Sixty percent of all seafood harvested in America comes from Alaska. We’re huge exporters. Last year, we exported almost $2.5 billion of seafood – from a state of 730,000 people. It’s a big issue for me. So on the TPA negotiations, I was very supportive and worked with the president’s cabinet trying to round up votes; worked with (Michael) Froman, the (U.S. Trade Representative); Secretary (of Commerce Penny) Pritzker; Secretary (of the Treasury Jack) Lew. And I got an amendment that’s hopefully going to get through on principal negotiating objectives for our U.S. Trade Rep on opening foreign markets for America seafood products. We’ve never had that as a principal negotiating objective – ever – in any TPA. A lot of foreign fishing fleets are heavily subsidized by the government. Ours are not. I thought this was a really important issue, certainly for my state, but also for the country.
“I was trying to work this into the customs bill and found that it’s important to get Democratic co-sponsors. So this amendment was not called the Sullivan Amendment. It was called the Sullivan-Markey-Warren Amendment. I went home to Alaska, and was bragging about the Sullivan-Markey-Warren Amendment and how it’s going to help our industry. Trust me – I got a couple of looks. But so what? Those guys have a fishing industry, too. They care about this issue. It helps their fishermen and people from Massachusetts. I just think if it’s good for the country and good for my state, then I’ll work with anybody.”