Former President Bill Clinton on Thursday urged Congress to put aside partisan differences and reauthorize the nearly 80-year-old US Export-Import Bank, which he said was key to helping the United States expand job-creating exports.
The Eximbank, which has its roots in the Great Depression-era administration of President Franklin Roosevelt, is facing an uncertain future because of opposition from some conservative Republicans. "So many of our competitors aggressively use subsidized capital to promote their exports," Clinton said in a speech to a packed room of corporate executives at the government export credit agency's annual meeting. "As a practical matter, you either meet the competition or you get beat."
The Eximbank provides direct loans and loan guarantees to help Boeing, General Electric, Caterpillar and many other big and small manufacturers make sales in markets too risky for private banks. Opponents say it is an unnecessary government intrusion in the market and puts taxpayer funds at risk. Supporters say it is conservatively run, has experienced very few defaults and makes money for the government.
Clinton said he feared renewal of the bank's charter, which expires May 31, was becoming a "political football."
"Support for the Eximbank used to be a bipartisan deal and I hope it will be again," Clinton said. He argued the United States was well positioned to become a more export-oriented economy and said terminating the Eximbank would amount to "unilateral disarmament."
Clinton also called for the United States to negotiate more free trade agreements and appeared to criticize President Barack Obama's administration for taking nearly two years to win approval of deals with South Korea, Colombia and Panama.
"There's only so slow you can go until you make the perfect the enemy of the good," he said.
The Eximbank has operated at record levels in recent years, as other sources of international trade finance remain tight in the wake of the global financial crisis.
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