Scott N. Paul is the founding Executive Director of the Alliance for American Manufacturing (AAM), which was launched in April 2007.

In just under 18 months, AAM has rapidly developed into an effective research and advocacy organization, publishing reports on the effectiveness of domestic trade laws and the consequences of China’s market-distorting practices. The Alliance successfully merged popular culture and manufacturing in 2007 with its “Keep It Made in America” Town Hall Meeting Tour, starring beloved actor John Ratzenberger, and subsequently hosted a nationally televised Presidential Candidates Forum on Manufacturing, featuring Sen. Barack Obama and Sen. Hillary Clinton, in April of 2008.

Mr. Paul brings twenty years of experience in policy, politics and advocacy to AAM. Prior to forming the Alliance, Mr. Paul was the principal lobbyist for the Industrial Union Council and was a trade lobbyist at the AFL-CIO, where he led the labor movement’s legislative initiatives on international trade, manufacturing, and foreign policy issues.

Mr. Paul’s Capitol Hill experience extends from 1987, when he held an internship with Senator Richard G. Lugar (R-IN), to 2001, when he served as the chief foreign policy and trade advisor to then-House Democratic Whip David E. Bonior (D-MI). He also served on the staff of the late Rep. Jim Jontz (D-IN) and former Rep. Peter Barca (D-WI). He was a candidate for the Indiana General Assembly in 1992.

Mr. Paul’s writings have been published in the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, and other national and regional publications; he has been quoted in those publications, as well as USA Today and the Associated Press. He has testified before committees of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, and has appeared as an expert on manufacturing, trade policy, and China on CNBC, CNN, and National Public Radio.

Mr. Paul earned a B.A. in Foreign Service and International Politics from the Pennsylvania State University and an M.A. with honors in Security Studies from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service. He was raised in Rensselaer, Indiana, and currently resides with his wife, Ilisa Halpern Paul, and their infant twin sons, Jonah and Micah, in Silver Spring, Maryland.

Blog Entries by Scott Paul

Obama's Asian Angst

1 Comments | Posted November 19, 2009 | 04:12 PM (EST)


I like that President Obama accords his Asian peers with respect, bowing if tradition calls for it, even though it raises the hackles of some wingnuts. But bowing to the wishes of China is another matter altogether. I'm completely underwhelmed with the results of the President's trip to China, especially...

Read Post

Building the New Economy

17 Comments | Posted October 23, 2009 | 02:16 PM (EST)


Ahead of the Oct. 29 'Building the New Economy' conference in Washington, one can state the obvious: something has gone terribly wrong with the U.S. economy. But chalking up the blame to a few bad apples on Wall Street and their risky financial instruments, and responding by simply providing...

Read Post

After the Tire Decision

22 Comments | Posted September 18, 2009 | 05:24 PM (EST)


President Obama deserves credit for making a tough call on trade. On September 11, he decided to impose tariffs on consumer tires from China for the next three years, resisting the pleas of most opinion elites across the nation and one of the principal financiers of our massive public...

Read Post

American Protectionism is a Myth

11 Comments | Posted July 21, 2009 | 06:10 PM (EST)


Our nation faces rising unemployment, staggering debts, shrinking trade, and no sense of when (and if) a real recovery -- one that reaches Main Street and working families -- will take hold.

As the federal government responds to these concerns, and especially since President Obama was sworn in, shrill warnings...

Read Post

American Manufacturing Doesn't Need a Bailout, Just a Level Playing Field

Posted April 10, 2009 | 12:38 PM (EST)


On Tuesday, I joined more than 1,000 people-mostly laid-off Steelworkers and their families in a dusty, windswept lot where piles of subsidized, imported steel pipe from India destined for a major oil pipeline served as the backdrop.

Just a mile or two away stood the Granite City, Illinois works...

Read Post

Don't Leave China Out of the Climate Debate

Posted March 25, 2009 | 03:24 PM (EST)


China's pollution costs lives, warms the planet, and distorts trade. It also harms American jobs. Unless the damage caused by China's pollution is addressed, the debates on climate change and global trade will inevitably get sidetracked and deadlocked.

China's steel industry deserves particular scrutiny because it accounts for a...

Read Post

The Dow vs. The Down and Out

Posted March 16, 2009 | 06:42 PM (EST)


The Dow breaks 7,000 and suddenly we're on the road to recovery? No, Wall Street is recreating a fantasy bubble that shuts out the continued torrent of real and painful economic news from communities all across America.

Here's the economic news you may have missed over the past seven days:

...
Read Post

'Late Show' Economics 101

Posted February 26, 2009 | 01:05 PM (EST)


Leave it to David Letterman to make the most critical economic point this year in one of his Top Ten lists. Maybe he should be the next Secretary of Commerce. Why? Because the late show host simply gets it in a way that most policymakers and pundits on the left...

Read Post

Time to End the Inquisition against Buy America Advocates

Posted February 13, 2009 | 04:43 PM (EST)


To hear the critics of Buy America, you would think those misguided souls advocating it, like 84% of the American public, are either out to start a global trade war, responsible for the creation of a second Great Depression, ignorant of economics, or guaranteeing pink slips for even more...

Read Post

Manufacturing a Dream and a Recovery

Posted January 22, 2009 | 04:44 PM (EST)


Barack Obama knows the story of American manufacturing firsthand. He cut his political teeth as a community organizer on the South Side of Chicago in the shadow of shuttered steel mills, working to salvage hopes and dreams that had been crushed by the weight of layoffs and economic decline. As...

Read Post

What Really Went Down in Pittsburgh

Posted April 19, 2008 | 02:35 PM (EST)


On Monday, Senator Barack Obama and Senator Hillary Clinton came to Pittsburgh for substantive dialogue about their trade policies and, particularly, how they plan to address China's unfair trade practices. The Alliance for American Manufacturing, a labor-management, non-partisan partnership, hosted the forum and rightly put the candidates on the spot...

Read Post

Keystone Concerns on China, Key to the Election?

Posted April 17, 2008 | 01:31 AM (EST)


Monday, manufacturing jobs took center stage at a candidates' forum sponsored by the Alliance for American Manufacturing in Pittsburgh featuring Senator Barack Obama and Senator Hillary Clinton.

Some pundits deride any candidate who stands up for manufacturing or who questions America's failed trade policies. They put labels...

Read Post

It's Time for Obama and Clinton to Step up to the Plate on China

2 Comments | Posted March 31, 2008 | 11:47 AM (EST)


Every day, America sends the equivalent of $700 million to China. That's the toll of our imbalanced trade relationship with the "butchers of Beijing." We send our manufacturing jobs, consumer dollars, and technological know-how to China. In return, we receive low-cost, under-inspected, and, all too often, unsafe consumer products. China...

Read Post

Who will Stand up for Ohio by Standing up to China?

Posted February 29, 2008 | 02:54 PM (EST)



I've finished watching the twentieth, and possibly final, Democratic candidate debate. For someone like me who follows economic and jobs issues closely, the debate was both fascinating and frustrating.

First, the fascinating. Both Senator Obama and Senator Clinton said they would renegotiate the job-killing North American Free...

Read Post

The Real Winner after Iowa and New Hampshire: Economic Issues

Posted January 9, 2008 | 06:36 PM (EST)


It's now confirmed: economic issues will drive both the Republican and Democratic primaries until the presidential nominees are determined. Exit polls in New Hampshire showed that pluralities of Democrats and Republicans rated the economy as the most important issue for them, outpacing Iraq, immigration, health care, and terrorism.

...
Read Post

Memo to the Mainstream Media: Stop Worshiping at the Failed Cult of Free Trade

Posted December 20, 2007 | 05:27 PM (EST)


Reporters often heap scorn upon the rigid views of social conservatives and evangelical Christians, but very few of them acknowledge their own overwhelming religious bias: too many reporters worship unflinchingly at the discredited cult of "free trade," even in the absence of facts to support their beliefs.


They...

Read Post

Drove My Chery To The Levee But The Levee Was Dry?

Posted December 5, 2007 | 11:01 AM (EST)


With apologies to Don McLean, we may all be singing "Bye-bye, American jobs" in a matter of months as cars from the Chery Automobile Company of China, spurred on by a sizable investment of technology and capital from Chrysler, start rolling into the United States in 2009.

This is a...

Read Post

UFOs or China: What's More Important to America's Future?

Posted November 15, 2007 | 03:56 PM (EST)


A presidential candidate debate in Las Vegas can't slide by without at least a couple gambling analogies, so here is my contribution: If the last Democratic debate is any indication, I'll bet the candidates are more likely to be asked in Las Vegas about whether they've seen a UFO (Dennis...

Read Post

The Philadelphia Story: The Democratic Debate

Posted October 29, 2007 | 02:32 PM (EST)


When the Democratic presidential candidates converge on Drexel University in Philadelphia for Tuesday night's DNC/MSNBC debate, which of them will draw on the rich history of that city to offer a new economic vision for America?

When people think of Philadelphia, Betsy Ross or the Declaration of Independence...

Read Post

Stop the Presses: Republicans Despise Free Trade... Do Their Candidates?

Posted October 8, 2007 | 05:30 PM (EST)


This is the moment I've been waiting for. Year after year, the Wall Street Journal pumps up the virtues of "free trade" through its own editorials, submissions on the op-ed page from various luminaries, rants against anyone who dares to challenge the orthodoxy and slanted news coverage of trade-related matters....

Read Post