President Trump Announces United States-Mexico Trade Agreement - NAFTA No More
President Trump Announces United States-Mexico Trade Agreement
(NAFTA No More - per Breitbart Headline)
https://media.breitbart.com/media/20...46-640x480.jpg
August 27, 2018
Michelle Moons
“It’s a big day for trade, big day for our country, a lot of people though we’d never get here because we all negotiate tough. We do, so does Mexico,” said Trump.
Trump told reporters he wanted to do away with the name NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement) in favor of a new trade deal, The United States México trade agreement. He said the name NAFTA has a bad connotation because the U.S. has been hurt badly by it. He called the new deal a really good deal for both countries, the U.S. and Mexico.
He added, “we’ll see if Canada can be part of deal.” President Trump spoke of possibly making a separate bilateral trade deal with Canada and that negotiations on that would start soon.
Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto joined the group by phone for the announcement.
In the room with Trump were U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer, Mexico’s Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray Caso, and Mexico’s Economic Minister Ildefonso Guajardo. Chief of Staff John Kelly, National Security Advisor John Bolton, and Senior Advisor to the President Jared Kushner.
News of the deal began breaking Monday morning ahead of the announcement. It comes on the heels of days of trade negotiations between the two countries.
“We’ve all worked very hard and your brilliant representatives are sitting right in front of me and I thought we would congratulate each other before it got out,” Trump told Nieto. “I know we’ll have a formal news conference in the not-too-distant future.”
Through a translator President Nieto thanked Trump and remarked that this is “very positive for the United States and Mexico.” He went on that the call was to “celebrate the understanding that [they] have had between both negotiating team on NAFTA.”
Nieto spoke of talks over months to renew, modernize, and update the trade deal between the nations as it relates to NAFTA. “And to generate a framework that will boost… productivity in North America,” said Nieto through the translator. “It is our wish now Mr. President that now Canada will also be able to be incorporated in all this.” Nieto said he was sure the U.S. and Canada will begin bilateral meetings on sensitive trade topics to their relationship.
The Mexican President acknowledged both Mexico and the U.S. negotiating teams including Lighthizer’s team. He thanked the support of the White House through Kushner. He thanked his own team from Mexico as well.
Trump thanked the Mexican President as well and referenced his meeting with Nieto in Mexico during the 2016 presidential campaign. “This is something that is very special for our manufacturers and for our farmers from both countries,” said Trump. “It’s also great trade and it makes it a much more fair bill.”
President Trump shared in thanking both trade teams. He spoke of the complicated nature of and months-long efforts that went in to forging the United States-Mexico Trade Agreement. He said that the U.S. hasn’t started with Canada yet as they wanted to work with Mexico first. President Trump said that many claimed it couldn’t be done due to the factions and complexity involved. “We made it much simpler, much better, much better for both countries,” said Trump.
Trump said they will be starting negotiations with Canada very soon and the he will be calling the Canadian Prime Minister. “If they’d like to negotiate fairly we’ll do that. You know they have tariffs of almost 300 percent on some of our dairy products so we can’t have that, we’re not going to stand for that,” said Trump. He indicated that the U.S. may levy tariffs on Canadian auto imports to the U.S. He suggested a separate deal would likely be forged with Canada, but left room for the possibility of including Canada in the deal with Mexico.
“The media should know that the President and the President-elect [of Mexico] worked very closely together,” said Trump of the new trade deal, acknowledging that Mexico will soon have a new President.
“It’s an incredible deal for both parties, most importantly it’s an incredible deal for the workers and for the citizens of both countries,” said Trump. He said the “farmers will be so happy.”
Trump added that they will be working with China, but that it’s “not the right time to talk” with China right now.
President Nieto then expressed hope that as they have reached a “final point of understanding” between the U.S. and Mexico on the deal that they can materialize a formalization of the agreement in the following days. Nieto confirmed the cooperation between himself and the president-elect of Mexico on the deal for a “highly unified front.”
Trump indicated he would soon see President Nieto and there would be a very formal ceremony to mark “one of the largest trade deals ever made.”
https://www.breitbart.com/big-govern...ade-agreement/
Mexican Minister Says Trade Deal in No Way Pays for Border Wall
By Eric Martin
August 27, 2018, 7:06 PM PDT
Trump’s previous demand on border wall hasn’t been discussed
Trade pact with U.S. removes one of most controversial topics
Mexico’s newly-announced trade agreement with the U.S. removes one of the most controversial topics in the relationship and in no way serves as a payment for a border wall, according to the Latin American nation’s top diplomat.
President Donald Trump’s promise to make Mexico pay billions of dollars for a wall to stop illegal immigration, a central point of his presidential campaign, hasn’t been a part of recent conversations between the nations as they worked to update the 24-year-old North American Free Trade Agreement, Mexican Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray said in an interview.
Trump launched his bid for the presidency three years ago by labeling some Mexican immigrants criminals and rapists. Mexico has repeatedly said paying for the wall is a non-starter, and the issue led President Enrique Pena Nieto to cancel trips to Washington twice in as many years, most recently in February. Videgaray said that the wall payment issue isn’t one that the U.S. has brought to the table with Mexico recently.
"It was indeed a point of tension, of public and notorious differences between Mexico and the United States, but I think that the decision we made not to allow a difference to define the rest of the relationship, that we could see beyond that difference, today is giving very obvious results," Videgaray said in an interview in Washington.
Significant Breakthroughs
Trump on Monday said he’s pursuing a new trade accord with Mexico to replace Nafta and called on Canada to join the deal soon or risk being left out. The deal is the biggest development in talks that began a year ago, punctuated by Trump’s repeated threats to quit Nafta altogether. Significant breakthroughs came during the past several days of bilateral talks on automobiles and energy. The three countries trade more than $1 trillion annually, much of it under the pact.
Talks to update Nafta began a year ago, but in recent weeks have been held between just the U.S. and Mexico. The U.S. president says the deal has led to hundreds of thousands of lost American jobs, and he promised to either change it to be more favorable to the U.S., or withdraw.
Trump’s relationship with Mexican President-elect Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador has started on a positive note. The two have exchanged complimentary letters, and Lopez Obrador said he plans to invite Trump to his inauguration. Jesus Seade, a World Trade Organization veteran who was Lope Obrador’s representative to Nafta talks, joined Videgaray and Mexican Economy Minister Ildefonso Guajardo from the outgoing government in announcing the deal with the U.S. on Monday.
The Trump and Pena Nieto administrations had been working for five weeks to resolve specific bilateral issues so Canada can rejoin the talks. The U.S. and Mexico are pushing for an agreement this month that would give the countries time to sign the pact before Lopez Obrador takes office in December.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...or-border-wall
