No deal yet in U.S.-Canada talks
Trump plans to sign trade accord with Mexico even without Canada
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump has notified Congress that he plans to sign a trade agreement with Mexico — and Canada, if it is willing — in 90 days, U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer said Friday.
Lighthizer made the announcement in a statement after high-stakes talks that the Trump administration and Canadian officials have been holding in Washington broke up Friday afternoon without a deal. Lighthizer said the talks will resume Wednesday.
The talks are intended to bring Canada into a new trade accord that would replace the North American Free Trade Agreement.
The flurry of events followed a preliminary agreement that the United States and Mexico reached Monday to replace NAFTA with an arrangement that is intended, among other things, to shift more auto manufacturing to the United States.
The Trump administration had insisted that it wanted a deal by Friday, beginning a 90-day countdown that would let Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto sign the pact before leaving office Dec. 1.
But under U.S. trade rules, the U.S. team wouldn’t have to make public the text of the revamped agreement for 30 additional days, possibly buying more time to reach a deal with the Canadians. Lighthizer’s statement Friday said Trump intends to sign a new trade deal with Mexico, whether or not Canada is part of it.
Earlier Friday, Trump was quoted as saying privately that he wouldn’t make compromises with Canada in their trade talks. His remarks raised doubts about whether the two countries could quickly reach a deal to keep Canada in the 24-year-old trading bloc, along with the United States and Mexico.
After the United States and Mexico reached its preliminary agreement Monday, Canada’s top trade envoy, Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland, rushed to Washington on Tuesday to try to negotiate Canada’s way back into a new version of NAFTA. The U.S.Canadian talks had been ongoing since then.
After sounding optimistic Thursday, Freeland appeared gloomier on Friday.
“We are looking for a good deal, not just any deal,” she told reporters, “and we will only agree to a deal that is a good deal for Canada. We are not there yet.”