News Analysis: U.S. President Obama's trade deal unlikely to pass Congress before he leaves office

U.S. President Barack Obama's signature Pacific trade deal seems unlikely to pass Congress before he leaves office in January, with growing opposition in both parties and the rise of anti-trade rhetoric in current presidential campaign, experts said.

While acknowledging the political difficulty in trade, Obama on Tuesday said that he isn' t giving up his push for the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement, a centerpiece of his second-term economic agenda.

"Right now, I'm president and I'm for it, and I think I've got the better argument," Obama said at a White House press conference with visiting Singapore's Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong.

Obama told reporters that some past U.S. trade deals had not delivered on all the benefits that were promised and had very localized costs, but the U.S. should cut off globalization.

"The answer is, how do we make sure that globalization, technology, automation, those things work for us, not against us? And TPP is designed to do precisely that," he argued.

Obama hoped that the TPP trade deal could still pass during the so-called lame-duck session of Congress after the November general election, the final time window before he leaves White House on Jan. 20.

"Hopefully, after the election is over and the dust settled, there will be more attention to the actual facts behind the deal and it won't just be a political symbol or a political football," he said.

But many lawmakers have cast doubt on a vote for TPP in the lame-duck session. Republicans, who traditionally back free trade deals, approved a party platform last month, saying that "significant trade agreements should not be rushed or undertaken in a lame-duck Congress".

Stephen Yates, chairman of the Idaho Republican Party and a member of the 2016 GOP Platform Committee, told Xinhua that "significant trade agreements" in the platform refers to all agreements that would include the TPP.

"Any incoming administration would seek that, given that it makes no sense when Congress is about to go out it would tie the hands of the incoming administration," Yates said, adding that there is significant political question about proceeding with TPP in its current form across both parties.

At the Republican National Convention more than a week ago, Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump reiterated his opposition to the TPP, saying that the TPP would "destroy" U.S. manufacturing and he promised to never sign massive trade deals again.

Several influential Republican leaders, including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch, have also expressed their reservations over provisions governing tobacco, pharmaceuticals and financial institutions in the TPP deal.

McConnell said last month that chances for the TPP to get a vote in Congress this year were "pretty slim", suggesting that the upper chamber could wait until the next president takes office.

Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton supported the TPP while she was secretary of state, but came out against it after the deal was completed last year. She believed the TPP in current form didn' t meet her "high bar" for creating good American jobs, raising wages and advancing national security.

John Podesta, chairman of Clinton' s presidential campaign, said last week that Clinton wouldn' t seek to simply tweak the language to approve the TPP deal if she became president.

"We need a new approach to trade," Podesta said. "We' re not about renegotiation. We' re not kind of interested in that. We' re interested in a new approach."

Lee' s state visit to Washington on Tuesday was intended to boost the TPP and enhance economic and security cooperation between the U.S. and Singapore. But during the joint press conference at the White House, Lee warned that the U.S. could lose its reputation and harm the relations with its allies in Asia if the country failed to ratify the TPP trade deal.

"I think in terms of America's engagement of the region, you have put your reputation on the line. It is the big thing which America is doing in the Asia-Pacific with the Obama administration consistently over many, many years of hard work and pushing," Lee said.

"If at the end, waiting at the altar the bride doesn't arrive, I think there are people who are going to be very hurt. Not just emotionally, but really damaged for a long time to come," he noted.

The TPP deal involves Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, the United States and Vietnam. It was formally signed by ministers from these 12 countries in February after more than five years' negotiation.

The TPP now undergoes a two-year ratification period in which at least six countries, which account for 85 percent of the combined gross domestic production of the 12 TPP countries, must approve the final text for the deal to be implemented.

Democratic Senator Chris Coons said that "TPP is dead" for the rest of this Congress and this administration, and the next administration will have to work hard to shore up U.S. relations in the Asia-Pacific region. Endite