In his State of the Union address last night, President Obama said: “It’s not fair when foreign manufacturers have a leg up on ours only because they’re heavily subsidized. Tonight, I’m announcing the creation of a Trade Enforcement Unit that will be charged with investigating unfair trade practices in countries like China.”

The Chamber strongly agrees that trade agreements aren’t worth the paper they’re written on if they aren’t enforced. We’ve long pressed for consistent and vigorous enforcement of our trade agreements.

But the United States government already has a Trade Enforcement Unit that enjoys broad respect, a clear inter-agency mandate, and a prominent position in the Executive Office of the President. It’s the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR), which the president proposed two weeks ago to fold into a larger agency along with much of the Commerce Department and other trade agencies.

The Chamber this week joined with more than 80 business and agricultural associations to send a letter to the president opposing moving USTR into a huge new bureaucracy. The letter reads in part:

“Subsuming USTR into a broader trade and business government department will severely harm [its] credibility and USTR’s ability to play its unique coordinating role within the U.S. government… such a move will weaken the ability of USTR and the United States to pursue effectively a strong trade policy that is responsive to Congress, business and other stakeholders and meets our country’s important objectives, including achieving the Administration’s important goal of doubling exports.”

We need to support USTR in its important trade enforcement (and negotiating) role, not build a new bureaucracy.