Advisers scrambled to stop Trump from ripping up NAFTA
President Donald Trump made a sweeping decision in August 2017 that could have rocked the global economy: the U.S. would pull out of NAFTA, the World Trade Organization, and its trade deal with South Korea.
Alarmed, Trump’s top staffers scrambled to stop him, according to Bob Woodward’s new book, Fear. Bloomberg News obtained a copy of the book ahead of its release, scheduled for Tuesday.
Then-top economic adviser Gary Cohn and staff secretary Rob Porter pulled chief of staff John Kelly into the Oval Office to convince Trump to back down. Soon, Secretary of State Rex Tillerwson and Defence Secretary James Mattis were brought into the fold and painted a dire picture of the national security and economic consequences of such amove.
The president acquiesced — but only temporarily.
The episode was one of several depicted by Woodward in which Trump’s top advisers managed to thwart the president’s efforts to make drastic changes to U.S. trade policy by arguing the time wasn’t right, distracting him with other matters, or sometimes sneaking documents off his desk.
Many advisers cited by Woodward have since left the administration, leaving fewer moderating voices in Trump’s inner circle, even as trade tensions with Canada and China continue to escalate.
‘DO IT TODAY’
Days after aides convinced Trump to back down from his August 2017 threat, the president was back at it. He had in hand a draft letter giving the required 180-day notice to pull out of the South Korean agreement. The letter, according to Woodward, was likely drafted by White House adviser Peter Navarro or Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, who frequently clashed with Cohn and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin over trade policy.
According to Woodward’s book, Trump said on Sept. 5, 2017, that he was ready to pull the trigger on quitting the agreement, known as Korus.
“We’re going to withdraw from this,” Woodward quotes Trump as saying. “I just need to wordsmith this and we’re going to get it on official stationery and send this off. We need to do it today.”
Again, several top aides jumped into action. Ultimately, Mnuchin made a breakthrough: he said the move would jeopardize Trump’s efforts to pass massive tax cuts by upsetting free trade Republicans in Congress. Trump agreed to hold off, but only until the tax legislation was passed.
Efforts to avert the U.S.’s withdrawal from major trade accords began soon after Trump’s inauguration, Woodward writes — indeed, one of Trump’s first acts as president was to pull the U.S. out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
About three months into his administration Trump told staff he wanted an executive order withdrawing the U.S. from the North American Free Trade Agreement with Canada and Mexico so he could announce it on his 100th day in office.
Porter contacted National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster to make the case that the move would create a national security nightmare.
The following day, an emergency meeting of the cabinet secretaries and top advisers was convened. There, Navarro pushed for withdrawal while Kelly, who was then director of Homeland Security, painted a grim picture of the economic and security consequences that would follow.
Still struggling to convince Trump, Porter brought Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue into the Oval Office. Perdue laid out for Trump the benefits to farmers from NAFTA and showed the president a map of the states that would be hurt the most, emphasizing that those included swing states and others with his biggest base of supporters.
Trump eventually decided he wouldn’t send the 180-day notice, but would ratchet up the rhetoric instead.