Trade often dominated Trump’s agenda, but it’s slipped from the 2020 forefront
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump has upturned the status quo on international trade unlike any modern-day occupant of the White House, fulfilling a campaign pledge to spare nobody’s feelings in taking on countries he’s long accused of ripping off the U.S.
The Republican’s tactics have often dominated his agenda, both politically and policy-wise, holding enormous stakes for a trade-dependent state such as Texas.
But trade has taken a back seat in the waning months of this year’s White House race between Trump and Democrat Joe Biden, even before the contest was jolted anew by an opening on the Supreme Court following the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Cross-border commerce, tariff fights and global trade deals have simply been supplanted by other matters — most notably, the pandemic and its resulting economic fallout.
“When you think about what’s going on with the health issues and the overall economic anxiety, I don’t know that trade will be at the top of the list of issues,” said Vance Ginn, chief economist at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, a conservative think tank based in Austin.
What’s most remarkable about that shift is that the fundamentals of Trump’s trade policy are all still there.
An epic trade war with China rages on. Tariffs on hundreds of millions of dollars in imports — typically paid for by U.S. businesses and consumers — remain a drag on the economy. A landmark revamp of a trade deal between the U.S., Mexico and Canada has now officially taken hold.
The president also continues to cite the issue as a foremost example of his “America First” mentality to governing.
But China’s role in the COVID-19 outbreak looms larger than its trade games
manship. Added tariff costs often pale in comparison to businesses’ existential crisis of finding enough customers amid the pandemic. The new North American trade pact hasn’t been in effect long enough to evaluate.
Perhaps the most telling signal of trade’s punctured standing as a campaign issue is that Biden has been comfortable enough to echo some of Trump’s views on the topic, even admitting that the president’s reboot of the North American trade deal is better than the original.
That approach may reflect a narrow focus on what both candidates see as a strong message to voters in manufacturing-heavy swing states in the Midwest. Or it may underscore how Trump has flipped the norms on cross-border commerce by being a Republican skeptical of free trade.
Or it may just be that Trump, in part by a scoring a win such as the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement, was unusual in bullying the nebulous topic of trade to the political forefront for as long as he did.
“Most people don’t vote on trade,” said Scott Lincicome,
a Texas native and trade expert at the libertarian Cato Institute, explaining that even significant changes in trade policy don’t always produce impacts that are obvious to everyday consumers.
Trade, in any case, remains a big deal in Texas.
The Lone Star State is among the biggest trading states in the U.S. Entire industries — and hundreds of thousands jobs — have cropped up to support that commerce. Both Republicans and Democrats in Texas tend to be relatively open to free trade, especially as it relates to North America.
So Trump’s swaggering trade rhetoric has held significant implications for the Lone Star State.
Trump pitched himself as a “tariff man.” He threatened to withdraw from the North American Free Trade Agreement, which he tagged as the “worst trade deal ever.” He accused not only rivals like China of taking advantage of the U.S., but also close allies like the European Union of doing the same.
The president then backed up those words with trade wars across the globe.
But “if you’re honest about his scorecard, it’s pretty modest,” said Antonio Garza, a Texan who served as U.S. ambassador to Mexico under President George W. Bush.
“This administration has been very good about identifying problems that in fact existed,” he continued, citing as an example China’s disregard for intellectual property rights. “But they’ve lacked a coherent strategy and approach to solving them.”
Trump succeeded in redoing NAFTA, but his U.S.Mexico-Canada Agreement mostly enshrined the trade deal he so despised. Trump reached a détente with China, but there’s little evidence Beijing is committed to any real concessions on trade. Trump captured the world’s attention with his tariffs, but Americans have often been left paying an ever-growing bill.
The end effect may depend on one’s perspective, even in Texas.
Justin Yancy, president of the Texas Business Leadership Council, described the overhauled North American pact as critical. Even though it’s not been in effect for long, the fact that the accord is a done deal has provided many businesses much-needed certainty, he said.
That assurance has taken on added importance amid the coronavirus pandemic, serving as a “silent engine in our recovery,” he added.