Union officials told Congress Tuesday that despite their criticisms of the North American Free Trade Agreement, they oppose pulling out of that trade deal before a replacement is in place. President Trump has repeatedly threatened to pull out of NAFTA as a means to force lawmakers to approve his U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement on trade.
“We are not there yet. There is still time to fix this agreement [USMCA], to make it so that we are not faced with that possibility,” Shane Larson, legislative director of the Communications Workers of America, told the House Ways and Means Committee Tuesday when asked if he would advocate withdrawing from NAFTA as opposed to approving USMCA or keeping the status quo.
Other labor officials testifying before the committee echoed Larson’s caution. “I associate with myself with what my colleagues said. We really need to focus on what could be done,” said Josh Nassar, legislative director for the United Auto Workers. “This Congress can assure there are better labor standards in the [USMCA] agreement.”
Their comments followed several criticisms of the NAFTA deal during the hearing. The officials argued that the deal allowed corporations and foreign governments to skirt labor rights by outsourcing work to regions with lower standards. “To give credit where credit is due, the labor chapters in USMCA are an improvement over NAFTA,” Larson said, though he added that they needed stronger enforcement provisions.
Trump warned last week in an interview with Fox Business he would try return to “maybe pre-NAFTA” if Congress doesn’t take up the USMCA deal. “NAFTA’s one of the worst trade deals ever made,” he said.
