The European Parliament can’t agree on what it wants in upcoming trade talks with the U.S., which may mean any final deal could have a hard time passing.
The body voted down legislation Thursday that would have set out its negotiating goals for the talks, leaving it with no official position.
The original draft of the nonbinding guide for the European Union’s negotiators said the talks could include automobiles but had to exclude agriculture and instructed negotiators to suspend talks altogether if the U.S. hits the EU with new tariffs.
Earlier on Thursday, a series of narrow votes by EU lawmakers resulted in several amendments to the legislation opposing trade talks, according to Reuters. Lawmakers opposed to the amendments then backed away from the underlying legislation and it failed.
The U.S. and EU agreed to talks last year but have yet to settle on date and have struggled to reach agreement on what they will even talk about. President Trump expressed his frustration Thursday during a St. Patrick’s Day event with Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar, saying, “if they don’t talk to us, then we are going to do something that is going to be pretty severe economically.”
The White House is demanding that the EU put its agricultural policies up for negotiation, but EU officials have refused. Trump has said that he may place 25 percent tariffs on autos and auto parts, a policy that would hit the EU hard, if the two cannot strike a deal.
