A 34-percent increase in the U.S.-China trade deficit prompted a bipartisan group of U.S. senators including Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., to introduce the Currency Exchange Rate Oversight Reform Act of 2013. Sponsors include U.S. Sens. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio; Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.; Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.; Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich.; Richard Burr, R-N.C.; Susan Collins, R-Maine; and, Robert Casey, D-Pa.

The bill if it becomes law would "reform and enhance oversight of currency exchange rates," Brown's office said. The bill would use U.S. trade law to counter the economic harm to U.S. manufacturers caused by currency manipulation, and provide consequences for countries that fail to adopt appropriate policies to eliminate currency misalignment, Brown said. The bill was introduced in advance of today's planned talks between President Obama and Chinese President Xi.

"American manufacturers and American workers are suffering from currency manipulation that unfairly impacts their ability to compete," Sessions said. "When another country undervalues its currency its manufacturers and exporters gain a significant trade advantage. Over time this manipulation has done serious damage to our economy."

The bill is a reintroduced Currency Exchange Rate Oversight Reform Act that passed the Senate 63-35 two years ago, Sessions said, "It will be important for President Obama to raise this issue when he meets with China's President Xi Jinping this week in California."

The Peterson Institute for International Economics in December concluded that currency manipulation by foreign governments costs the U.S. between 1 million and 5 million jobs and increases the U.S. trade deficit by $200 billion to $500 billion per year, Brown said.

The Hill's Peter Schroeder and Bernie Becker reported Thursday that Washington, D.C., lobbyists are trying to get their tax breaks on a special list being kept by House and Senate tax-writers. Senate Finance Committee Chairman Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., and House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Rep. Dave Camp, R-Mich., say they want to rewrite the tax code first approved 100 years ago. They want to start with a blank slate. Baucus said last year that every tax break "needs to prove it has a tangible benefit to our economy or society," The Hill reported. "If not, it doesn't belong in the tax code," the Montana Democrat argued

Lobbyists are scrambling to protect tax cuts for their clients. "What we're trying to do is set up a framework where we don't take the current tax code and see what individual thing we pull out," Camp said in the NPR interview. "But we take a blank piece of paper and start over."

Pentagon warns sequestration could hit small businesses hard in 2014     

Al.com (Gore 6/6) "Small businesses will feel the greatest impact if sequestration stretches into 2014, the Pentagon's top acquisition official told a Navy industry forum on Monday. Speaking to the 2013 Navy Opportunity Forum in Arlington, Va., Frank Kendall, undersecretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics, said, "It's a reasonable possibility that we will go into 2014 with sequestration still underway. 'A lot of things we planned on doing we won't be able to.'

"Pentagon officials have signaled they expect sequestration - which began March 1 and is set to take $37 billion from the Department of Defense budget this year - to last into fiscal 2014. If that happens, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel said the Pentagon will lose $52 billion next year. These across-the-board cuts will have a huge impact on small businesses that contract with the military, Kendall said.

'The cuts we are going to experience potentially will fall on small businesses more than on large military contractors,' he said. A study conducted last year by Dr. Stephen Fuller of George Mason University showed up to 2 million jobs, almost half from small businesses, could be lost due to sequestration. Those figures haven't played out yet, but Fuller said it may just be a matter of time.

'Many small businesses are subcontractors, suppliers and vendors to larger scale businesses that are the prime federal contractors that have little recourse when their contracts with their primes are scaled back or terminated,' Fuller said."

Farm bill wins procedural votes, as many as 240 amendments filed

POLITICO (Rogers 6/6) "Farm bill advocates won a strong procedural vote in the Senate Thursday morning, clearing the way for passage next week and boosting efforts by the House to move ahead this month with its own five-year plan to revamp major commodity programs. The 75-22 roll call easily surpassed the 60-vote threshold needed to invoke cloture. And after all the frustration of the past year, the lopsided margin reflects a renewed determination to just get the farm legislation into a House-Senate conference this summer and try to strike some final compromise.

"A bloody fight lies ahead in the House, scheduled to take up its bill the week of June 17. But having blocked floor action last year, Speaker John Boehner will find it harder to justify more stalling after the bipartisan showing in the Senate Thursday. Indeed for the remaining debate time in the Senate, the Agriculture Committee leadership will be in the driver's seat in defining what amendments will still be allowed before a final vote on passage, possibly as early as Monday."