Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said it was a mystery to him why House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., had not yet scheduled a vote on President Trump’s U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement on trade. Pelosi has raised concerns over the deal’s enforcement mechanisms.
“I hope that the speaker brings it to floor quickly. I think this will pass. I don’t know why it hasn’t been scheduled yet. So we look forward to her bringing it to the floor,” Mnuchin told CNBC Wednesday.
The Trump administration has eagerly courted Pelosi’s support for the deal, which would replace the 1993 North American Free Trade Agreement. U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer has made repeated trips to Capitol Hill to talk to her and other Democrats and gone out of his way to praise the speaker at committee hearings.
White House officials are eager to get the deal through Congress by this summer. They see a narrow window of time to get it done before the 2020 election kicks in and Canada holds its election later this year, both of which could complicate the deal’s odds of passage.
But the speaker has been at best noncommittal about the trade deal. She has praised aspects of it but also said she has concerns regarding its enforcement provisions. She has repeatedly demanded that Mexico in particular live up to its obligations under the agreement by adopting legislative changes called for in the deal.
“Unless you do this, we can’t even consider it,” Pelosi said this month. “We have to see that [Mexico passes] the legislation, that they have the factors in place that will make sure it’s implemented, and they demonstrate some commitments in sincerity, because it’s a big issue how workers are treated in Mexico.”
