Canada stays cool after Trump turns up heat with NAFTA threat
OTTAWA— Prime Minister Justin Trudeau shrugged off blustery anti-free trade comments by Donald Trump, saying he’s heard it before and Canada would press ahead with talks “in good faith” no matter what.
Trudeau, speaking in Montreal, said he’s had “a number” of private conversations with the U.S. president “where he talked about exiting the NAFTA agreement.”
Yet Trudeau said “I have confidence in the substance of that agreement” and he remains “very positive” about the prospects of reaching a new deal that will improve and update the 23-year-old pact.
“We’re negotiating in good faith and working hard to do just that, but we’re going to stay focused on the hard work we have ahead of us at the negotiation table and that’s how we’ve approached this from the very beginning, and I don’t see anything changing,” Trudeau said.
Trudeau pushed the same keep-calm-and-carry-on approach adopted by Canadian and U.S. officials earlier Wednesday in reaction to Trump’s inflammatory speech in Phoenix, Ariz., the night before.
“Personally, I don’t think we can make a deal because we have been so badly taken advantage of.” DONALD TRUMP SPEAKING TUESDAY NIGHT AT A RALLY IN PHOENIX
He said the North American Free Trade Agreement has created both millions of jobs and economic growth on both sides of the border.
Trump told an Arizona campaignstyle said the U.S. would “probably” end up terminating NAFTA, a threat that hangs over formal negotiations that began just last week.
Trump suggested Canada and Mexico were the ones who negotiated great deals, while the U.S. was suckered. “Personally, I don’t think we can make a deal because we have been so badly taken advantage of,” Trump said.
Canada’s foreign affairs minister’s office dismissed the remarks as “heated rhetoric” and reacted coolly to Trump’s trash-talking NAFTA.
Trudeau stressed that the agreement has been updated nearly a dozen times since it set rules for tarifffree trilateral trade and investment in 1994. He said the current talks are an “opportunity to improve and update it.”
“Nothing will distract us from that serious and positive approach we’re taking to those negotiations,” Trudeau said in French.
On two other key foreign policy files, however, Trudeau drew a sharper contrast between his government and Trump’s, on its military approach toward North Korea and Afghanistan.
Trudeau was asked if his government has shut the door on Canadian participation in the U.S. missileshield program or on sending Canadian military and police officers back into Afghanistan.
Trudeau said keeping citizens safe is “a responsibility that we take very seriously, but we also make sure that we are always standing up for Cana-
“We will always take the decisions in . . . what is (in) the best interests of Canadians.” PRIME MINISTER JUSTIN TRUDEAU
dian sovereignty, for Canadians’ capacity to make decisions about our own national security.”
“In those cases, we will always take the decisions in ... what is (in) the best interests of Canadians, and our longstanding positions on those two issues are not going to be changed anytime soon.”
Trudeau’s trade comments expanded on a statement from the office of his Foreign Affairs minister, Chrystia Freeland.
“As we said last week, trade negotiations often have moments of heated rhetoric,” said Adam Austen, a spokesman for Freeland. “Our prior- ities remain the same, and we will continue to work hard to modernize NAFTA, supporting millions of middle-class jobs.”
Freeland’s Mexican counterpart, Luis Videgaray, tweeted in Spanish: “No surprises: we are already in a negotiation. Mexico will remain on the table with serenity and firmness and national interest ahead.”
Even Trump’s own chief trade official tried to downplay the significance or newsworthiness of Trump’s latest remarks.
U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer said in a statement, “President Trump has been clear from the very beginning that, if the NAFTA renegotiation is unsuccessful, he will withdraw from the agreement.
“Under the President’s direction,” Lighthizer said, the trade office “has begun renegotiating NAFTA to seek substantial changes that address its fundamental failures and create fair trade policy that benefits all Americans.”
Canada has carried out a full-courtpress south of the border to woo allies in the U.S., even as it publicly says it welcomes a chance to “modernize” the deal.
Canada lavished particular attention on 11 U.S. states that have large populations, are large trading partners or carry big political weight for the Trump administration, whether because they are Republican strongholds, or are states where the vote flipped to Trump in 2016: Texas, Wisconsin, Indiana, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Kentucky, Ohio, Florida, Iowa, California and New York.
On Tuesday, Trudeau once again touted the economic benefits that NAFTA has had for individual states and for the U.S. business community that he said “understands” a border that allows freer trade brings economic growth to all.