Senator Sherrod Brown met with steel workers in Warren to discuss his latest bill that opposes the Biden administration's latest trade deal that Brown believes hurts Valley workers.  

Senator Brown joined Mahoning Valley workers and leaders at the USW Local 1375 hall to discuss his efforts to push the Biden administration to drop the entire trade pillar from their proposed Indo-Pacific Economic Framework. 

Senator Brown also discussed his Fight Trade Cheats Act and Leveling the Playing Field 2.0 Act, which aims to strengthen trade enforcement and stop cheating by foreign actors. 

Brown says that his bill would help protect Valley industrial rates, protect workers and increase wages. 

"My values have always been clear: no trade deals without strong, enforceable labor standards – standards that guarantee Ohio workers a real, level playing field. That's why I stood up to the trade pillar in the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework that the Administration was negotiating, and they backed down," said Brown.

Brown has long fought to give Ohio workers and businesses stronger tools against foreign companies and countries that evade our trade laws, hurting Ohio manufacturers and putting Ohioans out of work. 

"From NAFTA to the Central American Free Trade Agreement to normalizing trade relations with China to the Trans-Pacific Partnership, I've fought against bad deal after bad deal, negotiated by president of both parties, on behalf of Ohio workers. That will never change," said Brown. 

The Senator has gained a history of labor support in the valley - something that political analysts say could be tested the upcoming election. 

“This isn't him sweeping in and trying to cultivate support with those audiences for the first time. He's made a career out of supporting labor unions and supporting those kinds of issues in the past,” Dr. J. Cherie Strachan, professor and Director of the Ray C. Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron said. 

For generations, Democratic candidates in the Valley had strong labor support- that's until many switched to Donald Trump when he began using many of the same talking points. 

“Obviously those are important voters to speak to {about} things that affect their jobs, things that affect their take home pay,” Dr. Strachan said. “It's something that certainly needs to be backfilled and reinforced so he's probably making all the right moves.”

A key demographic Senator Brown is hoping to hold onto. 

“My job, always, is to help make sure that workers are represented,” Senator Brown said. “I do that in campaign years, I do that in non campaign years.”