AP, Washington :
Snubbing Canada, the Trump administration reached a preliminary deal Monday with Mexico to replace the North American Free Trade Agreement – a move that raised legal questions and threatened to disrupt the operations of companies that do business across the three-country trade bloc.
President Donald Trump suggested that he might leave Canada, America’s No. 2 trading partner, out of a new agreement. He said he wanted to call the revamped trade pact “the United States-Mexico Trade Agreement” because, in his view, NAFTA had earned a reputation as being harmful to American workers.
But first, he said, he would give Canada a chance to get back in – “if they’d like to negotiate fairly.” To intensify the pressure on Ottawa to agree to his terms, the president threatened to impose new taxes on Canadian auto imports.
Canada’s NAFTA negotiator, Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland, is cutting short a trip to Europe to fly to Washington on Tuesday to try to restart talks.
“We will only sign a new NAFTA that is good for Canada and good for the middle class,” said Adam Austen, a spokesman for Freeland, adding that “Canada’s signature is required.”
“There is still a great deal of uncertainty -.. trepidation, nervousness – a feeling that we are on the outside looking in,” said Peter MacKay, a former Canadian minister of justice, defense and foreign affairs who is now a partner at the law firm Baker McKenzie.
