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Whatever disparaging things US President Donald Trump may now say about the trade deal he negotiated with Canada and Mexico during his first term, key players in Washington’s tight-knit lobby are hopeful the deal will go ahead.
Trump recently described the Canada-US-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA) as ineffective, said the US would be better off without it and suggested that the best feature of the agreement is the ability to terminate it.
Despite that, the leaders of the US agricultural industry – the sector most in favor of CUSMA – are not worried about the future of the trade agreement as it will be reviewed jointly on July 1.
A message from agriculture insiders at a conference in Washington, DC, on Wednesday said the agreement has brought widespread benefits to American farmers, the food industry and consumers.
They believe that the deal that Trump signed in his first term was too successful for him to tear it up in his second term.
Two of the conference speakers were members of the US negotiating team during the negotiations that led to the signing of the agreement in 2018. The agreement is known in the US as the USMCA.
Darci Vetter, now vice president of public affairs for Driscoll’s, one of North America’s largest fruit producers, was the senior agricultural consultant at the US Trade Representative’s Office from 2014 to 2017 under the Obama administration.
“I’m actually confident and very hopeful that at the end of this, we’ll still have the USMCA,” Vetter told CBC News in an interview.
‘It can be a tough journey’
“For all the issues and questioning of the agreement, you have industries in all three countries that are already very coordinated and willing to do this work,” Vetter said.
Canada and Mexico are the only countries granted broad exemptions from Trump’s global tariffs, which Vetter says is due to the CUSMA mandate.
However, he warns that the road to a renegotiated agreement will not be smooth or easy.
“I think it’s going to be a tough trip,” Vetter said.
“I don’t think we should underestimate the extent to which the president himself is questioning trade relations and trade agreements, and I think some of his concerns are genuine. But I think in the end, we’re going to conclude a deal.”
CUSMA remains in force until 2036 unless one of the countries gives six months’ notice of withdrawal. It is not clear whether Trump has the power to withdraw the United States from the agreement without the support of Congress.
While Canada and Mexico have said they want the deal extended beyond 2036, the Trump administration is using the joint review as an opportunity to renegotiate some of the terms of CUSMA.
The US has held two rounds of official talks with Mexico and has another scheduled for mid-July. Meanwhile, Canada-US talks are on the back burner, although Canada-US Trade Minister Dominic LeBlanc met twice this month with US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer.
‘The evidence is compelling’
Injecting uncertainty into negotiations is part of the negotiation process, said John Bode, president and CEO of the US Corn Refiners Association.
“I’m confident the USMCA will continue,” Bode told CBC News.
“The evidence is compelling that this agreement will benefit the people of North America, be it Canada, America or Mexico, and it would be bad for all of us to break up,” said Bode.
Gregg Doud, who served as US agriculture negotiator for nearly three years during the Trump administration, also expressed strong support for CUSMA.
Doud, now president and chief executive of the National Milk Producers Federation, hailed the deal as the “gold standard” of trade agreements around the world.
“This is the template. We will not deviate from that going forward,” Doud said at the conference, organized by the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
He cited CUSMA’s approach to resolving trade disputes between the three countries as a major improvement over its predecessor, the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).
“You can always make us better,” Doud said. “But it’s a lot better than it was before.”
Canadian trade officials have agreed to meet with their US and Mexican counterparts on July 1 to discuss signing an extension to the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA) as US President Donald Trump continues to cast doubt on the future of the trade deal.
Doud said the US would want to discuss access to the Canadian dairy market. He also expressed concern that some countries, such as China, unfairly benefit from the trade agreement by exporting products to the US duty-free through Mexico.
However, he gave no indication that the Trump administration actually wants to abandon CUSMA.
Still, after his panel discussion, Doud was reluctant to answer questions from CBC News about Trump’s attitude toward the deal he signed back in 2018.
“I won’t go into that. You have to ask him,” Doud said when asked why the president keeps looking down on CUSMA.
But should people be worried about the future of the agreement?
Doud paused for a few seconds before answering: “It’s all negotiation.”
