The Trump administration remains "extremely hopeful" that Canada will join the United States and Mexico ahead of a Friday deadline on a pact to replace the North American Free Trade Agreement, Council of Economic Advisers Chairman Kevin Hassett said Wednesday.
“We’re hearing there is a lot of progress being made, and it’s possible we’ll be able to see something sometime soon,” Hassett told Fox Business' "Mornings with Maria."
“We’re extremely hopeful that Canada will join.”
Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland came to Washington on Tuesday for renewed talks and told reporters on Wednesday she remains hopeful that Canada will be able to meet the Friday deadline.
The cutoff is a "real thing," Hassett said, that is when U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer will send a letter to Congress about the new agreement. The letter starts the 90-day period for lawmakers to consider the agreement.
Hassett noted that there are some areas of disagreement that could push Canada away, including President Donald Trump's insistence on a deal that has "zero tariffs, zero non-tariff barriers, fully reciprocal trade, which is included in the arrangement between the United States and Mexico."
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in June that a sunset clause that limits the agreement to just five years is also a sticking point. Mexico also did not want that to be part of the deal, but on Saturday, the country's incoming trade negotiator said the sunset clause will come out.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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