End of Bahrain trade deal would ripple through Florida

WASHINGTON — The looming expiration of a U.S. trade deal with Bahrain in the Middle East is reverberating thousands of miles away in a tiny Florida Panhandle town.

WestPoint Home operates a textile plant in the rural Washington County hamlet of Chipley, employing about 250 workers who make comforters, quilts and other home furnishings. The company warns it may have to close the facility if forced to pay higher tariffs for the raw materials it imports from the small island nation in the Persian Gulf.

Chipley Mayor Lee Dell Kennedy said losing the region's largest employer would devastate hundreds of families living in and around the railroad town of about 3,500 between Tallahassee and Pensacola.

"This is a small town and we need all the jobs we can get, trust me," Kennedy said. "WestPoint has been here a long time and it means a lot to us."

The trade deal, which removes tariffs on certain goods traded between Bahrain and the U.S., expires next year.

Invoking the potential plight of Chipley, Florida lawmakers, including Reps. Gwen Graham, D-Tallahassee, and Jeff Miller, R-Chumuckla, are pushing to extend the "trade preference level" arrangement through 2026.

Those efforts took a hit Wednesday when the Senate Finance Committee rejected Florida Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson's attempt to attach the extension to a larger trade bill. Nelson's proposal failed on a mostly party-line 10-16 vote, with most Republicans opposed.

Nelson said there are national security as well as economic reasons to extend the trade agreement, because Bahrain is home to the U.S. Navy's Fifth Fleet.

"There are going to be consequences if we don't (extend) it, " Nelson warned his committee colleagues before the vote. "You know all of our activities and how much Bahrain has been an ally of ours in that war that we're pursuing over there against the terrorists. I'm afraid this is going to be big news in Bahrain, that the United States has turned on its heel."

He got no sympathy from North Carolina Republican Sen. Richard Burr, whose state was the epicenter of the U.S. textile industry until cheaper foreign competition prompted many manufacturers to close.

Trade deals like the one with Bahrain are killing what's left of the industry in the U.S., Burr told Nelson.

"I'd just as soon fight for the ones that are left and fight for the opportunity for the United States textile industry to be as lucrative and forceful as anybody else in the rest of the world," he said. "And you don't do that by extending trade preference levels."

Nelson's office said Thursday it was "unclear" what the next step would be.

WestPoint Home officials didn't respond to requests for comment Thursday.

The firm operates a textile facility in Bahrain that produces yarn used for what Nelson called the "stuffing" in comforters and other home textiles sold by major retailers including Target, Dillard's and Costco. The fabric is then shipped, duty-free, to the Chipley facility, where it's assembled into finished products ready for distribution.

Without preferential trade agreement, WestPoint Home's plant in Bahrain couldn't compete with textile manufacturers in India and China, officials said.

Graham last month introduced a bill, co-sponsored by Miller, that would extend the trade preference level with Bahrain. The Northwest Florida Jobs Certainty Act has been referred to the Ways and Means Committee but no hearing has been set.

Earlier this month, Graham spent a day meeting workers and stuffing comforters as part of a "workday" program she conducts in parts of her district to get acquainted with constituents.

"The textile industry in America, like all manufacturing, has faced extraordinary challenges over the last 20 years," Graham said after meeting with workers. "WestPoint Home is the only remaining major home-textile company in the country, and the factory in North Florida is their last with open doors. We need to do everything we can to level the playing field (and) protect these jobs."

Contact Ledyard King at lking@gannett.com; Twitter: @ledgeking