Just Say No: Michigan Lawmakers Up In Arms Over Allowing Japan In TPP

A block of congressional lawmakers from both sides of the aisle and chamber register their dissent for Japan's pending entry to the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade talks over so-called "significant, long-standing and persistent economic barriers," according to a recent letter to the White House.

To encourage new Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to bring his nation into the TPP fray, U.S. President Barack Obama recently agreed to take autos off the negotiations table, something that has left Michiganders on Capitol Hill distraught.

"Nowhere is the closed nature of Japan’s markets more evident than in the auto sector, where Japanese policies and practices have been carefully honed – over generations – to keep out American and other foreign cars and parts," the letter, which has more than a dozen signatures, states, according to a recent Detroit Free Press story.

The country just doesn't want to open up its auto sector to outside competition, the lawmakers argue.

"The barriers to American autos in the Japanese market are deeply structured, shifting and impervious to American negotiating efforts," notes the letter.

Read all about it: http://on.freep.com/15PaB2G.