Trudeau protecting the Loony.
Both U.S. and Mexican officials have said they are close to reaching a deal on North American Free Trade Agreement, possibly within the next few days, a prospect that NAFTA’s third partner, Canada, has only been able to observe from the sidelines.
The U.S.-Mexican talks are expected to continue into next week and it is unclear to what extent Canada will be to weigh in, if at all.
U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer has been meeting exclusively throughout the week in Washington, D.C., with his Mexican counterpart Economic Minister Ildefonso Guajardo to hammer out a deal, and both sides say they are very close. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has tried to tamp down any fears that his country was being sidelined, arguing Canada is still very much involved in the process and not alarmed by the U.S. talking directly with Mexico.
“We are encouraged by the optimism expressed by the U.S. and Mexico … [and] continue the hard work of modernizing and negotiating a better deal for all of us,” Trudeau said Thursday in British Columbia following a Cabinet meeting.
Steve Globerman, senior fellow at the Fraser Institute, a free-market Canadian think tank, said the talks this week clearly reflected a divide-and-conqueror strategy by the Trump administration. “If the U.S. and Mexico come to an agreement in principle it is going to put more pressure on Canada to bend at the margins. … It makes Canada a little more vulnerable.”