Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue said Thursday that the talks to redo the North American Free Trade Agreement have made significant progress recently and a renegotiated deal likely will be completed before the end of the year, possibly as early as next month.
“I am hearing encouraging reports from the U.S. Trade Representative’s Office. I am hear encouraging reports from our contacts in other countries. My impression is that we are much closer and much more amicable with Mexico,” Perdue told the Washington Examiner.
He cautioned that Canada remains “somewhat intransigent” on some issues including access to U.S. agriculture products, but added, “I think we will get a deal.”
The Trump administration faces a deadline of sorts on July 1, when the current authorization of Trade Promotion Authority is set to expire. TPA limits Congress to strict yes or no votes on trade deals, preventing lawmakers from amending them. The White House has called for TPA to be extended, but there is no guarantee that Congress will go along. Also, Mexico has a presidential election July 1, which could shift the politics in the country.
“Hopefully we will have NAFTA done by then,” Perdue said when asked about TPA’s expiration date.
U.S., Canadian and Mexican officials met in Washington starting last week to continue the negotiations, which have stretched on since August. After a long period of stalemate, with Canada and Mexico jointly opposing most of the Trump administration’s proposals to update the 1993 deal, there have been recent signs of a thaw.
The administration has reportedly softened its demands on stricter rules for how much of a car’s parts must be made in America before it can avoid tariffs under NAFTA, a key issue in the talks because the auto industry supply chain spreads across the North America.
Perdue has not been directly involved in the renegotiations, but he is regularly briefed on them by U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer.
