President Trump Secures Modern, Rebalanced Trade Agreement with Canada and Mexico

USMCA is a great deal for all three countries, solves the many deficiencies and mistakes in NAFTA, greatly opens markets to our farmers and manufacturers, reduces trade barriers to the U.S. and will bring all three Great Nations together in competition with the rest of the world.

President Donald J. Trump

President Donald Trump and his administration have delivered on his campaign promise to renegotiate NAFTA and deliver a modern and rebalanced trade deal with Mexico and Canada. For years, politicians have called for the renegotiation of NAFTA, but President Trump is following through where others have failed and this new agreement will update and rebalance the 24-year-old NAFTA with modern provisions to serve the interests of American workers and businesses.

“I would like to thank President Trump. Your leadership, vision, and grit made this agreement possible,” U.S. Trade Representative Peter Navarro told reporters. “No other person could have done it.”

Fox News contributor Juan Williams referred said the deal was really only for “some milk farmers” but, the secured a number of wins for American farmers, ranchers, businesses and workers. The deal will help American auto manufacturers and workers will benefit from new rules of origin requiring 75 percent of auto content to be produced in North America and incentivize billions of dollars in additional United States vehicle and auto parts production. Currently, only 62.5% of a vehicle has to be from North America to qualify for zero-tariff trade.

USMCA also incentivizes the use of high-wage manufacturing labor in the auto sector, supporting better jobs for American workers while representing the strongest labor provisions of any trade agreement. USMCA is a win for American farmers, ranchers, and agribusiness as it includes important improvements that will enable food and agriculture to trade more fairly:

• Canada will eliminate its “Class 7” program that allows low-priced dairy ingredients to undersell American dairy products
• Canada will provide new access for American dairy products, eggs, and poultry

The U.S. Mexico and Canada Agreement will bring our trade relationship with Canada and Mexico into the 21st century by remedying the faults in NAFTA that incentivized offshoring, leading many manufacturing jobs to leave the United States. The agreement also protects U.S. company’s intellectual property rights including protections for biologic drugs and other innovations. The intellectual property chapter is over sixty pages and includes provisions on patents and trademarks that many industry leaders and legal experts have been calling for.

The deal does not exempt Canada from the 25% tariff on aluminum and steel. According to the White House, those negotiations are on a separate track.

The landmark deal represents a major campaign promise delivered to the American people – a promise many said could not be completed. Pundits and politicians said that NAFTA could not be renegotiated in just a few months, but that is what President Trump has done – and he did by putting America first.