One day after signing a new trade deal with China, Donald Trump received a second victory for his trade agenda as the Senate passed a new North American pact.
As as lawmakers prepared to read aloud charges against Trump in his impeachment trial the Senate voted 89 to 10 pass the revised United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA). Trump is expected to sign the deal next week.
The Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, described the pact as a major win for the Trump administration.
Trump blamed the current trade pact with Canada and Mexico, the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta), for sending millions of manufacturing jobs to low-wage plants south of the US border. His administration secured changes that aim to have more cars produced where workers earn an average of at least $16 an hour.
It also secured changes that require Mexico to rewrite its laws to make it easier for workers to form independent unions, which should improve worker conditions and wages and reduce the incentive for US companies to relocate their plants.
While the administration completed its negotiations with Canada and Mexico more than a year ago, Democrats in the House insisted on changes to the pact that they say make it more likely Mexico will follow through on its commitments. As part of those negotiations, the administration agreed to drop a provision that offered expensive biologic drugs made from living cells 10 years of protection from cheaper knockoff competition.
Republicans and the president have complained about how long it took to complete the negotiations, but the talks resulted in a rare mix of support for USMCA. The AFL-CIO, an association of trade unions, endorsed the measure along with scores of business and farm groups.
The biggest holdouts are environmental groups, which continue to oppose the measure because it doesn’t address climate change. Indeed, they contend the agreement would contribute to rising temperatures.
Mary Lovely and Jeffrey Schott, economists at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, said the new deal “modestly” improved on its predecessor but remained problematic and was no guarantee of an end to trade wars.
“Unfortunately, given a US president who sees tariffs as America’s main stick to ensure compliance with US demands, peace is not guaranteed,” they wrote.
Senator Dick Durbin, a Democrat, marveled on Wednesday at how leaders of organized labor and farm groups in his state appeared together to support the pact.
“They both agree that this USMCA trade agreement is a step forward, an improvement over the original Nafta,” Durbin said. “I think we’ve added to this process by making it truly bipartisan.”
