(WASHINGTON, D.C.)—An early start, relentless trade education efforts and a highly effective grassroots organization by The Business Roundtable (BRT) helped provide the winning margin in today’s House vote on extending Permanent Normal Trade Relations (PNTR) status to China.

"Our grassroots field operations have been the ‘stealth weapon’ and real backbone of this successful effort," said BRT President Samuel L. Maury. "We have had pro-trade workers coordinating our efforts in key congressional districts across America for more than two years. They have helped spread the message to our elected representatives that trade works for working Americans."

The BRT began to lay the groundwork on this campaign in 1998 and 1999 by commissioning a series of over 120 reports on the impact of trade on specific congressional districts and the opportunities that increased trade with China would have on each of the 50 states. These reports were widely distributed through BRT’s grassroots organization, currently active in 19 states and 88 congressional districts. The reports identified over 14,000 companies across America that create jobs in their communities through trade and clearly demonstrated that China’s 1.3 billion person marketplace would create enormous new opportunities.

Armed with this data, BRT’s locally based organizers conducted over 500 face-to-face meetings with members of Congress and staff members in their districts over the last four months. In addition, they generated thousand of letters, phone calls and e-mails to Congress, and produced more than 200 public events, editorial board visits, news stories, op-eds, and letters-to-the-editor to promote PNTR.

"We went directly into local communities to outline the benefits of trade, and this vote shows that it worked. On this campaign we started early, focused our activities at the grassroots level, and clearly identified the benefits to the public," Maury added. "The BRT reached out to the public and listened to their concerns about trade. We responded with a highly informative and locally based campaign that clearly demonstrated the value of opening China’s markets. This was truly a win-win scenario."

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