House Democrats Tuesday said the fate of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement hinges on U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer’s response to their demands for changes in the trade deal.
Democrats discussed the pending trade deal in a conference call, according to an aide on the call.
House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal of Massachusetts is leading the discussions on behalf of Democrats and told lawmakers, “the ball is in the USTR’s court.”
Democrats want to reopen the trade deal to add tougher labor and environmental standards as well as changes to language in the deal they believe will hike prescription drug prices if left unaltered.
“Chairman Neal said he expects the pace of negotiations will also increase in September,” the aide said.
“Chairman Neal emphasized the importance of enforcement, and that the United States has to be able to challenge trade decisions in Mexico and Canada and for it to stand up afterward.”
Republicans are urging Pelosi to take up the USMCA, but Pelosi said she will not consider the deal until the changes are implemented to the underlying deal and not merely encoded in side-deal language.
Pelosi also told Democrats on the call she blasted Trump’s decision to shift $3.6 billion in military construction funds to pay for the extension of the southern border wall in a conversation with Secretary of Defense Mark Esper in a call earlier Tuesday.
“My view of it is that stealing money from military construction, at home and abroad, will undermine our national security, quality of life and morale of our troops, and that indeed makes America less safe,” Pelosi said she told Esper.
“The President is negating the Congress’s most fundamental principles — the Constitution’s most fundamental principle — the separation of powers. By assaulting the Constitution’s power, our power of the purse, and he’s undermining the oath of office he takes to protect and defend the Constitution and the American people.”
