The Senate Finance Committee on Tuesday approved President Trump’s U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement on trade with a bipartisan vote of 25-3, setting up the deal’s eventual passage through Congress. The full Senate is expected to vote on the deal later this month, giving Trump a long-sought policy victory in an election year.
“I’m proud of the hard work of many individuals that made it possible to achieve a strong agreement and a bill that could garner broad support,” said Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, an Iowa Republican. “The bill before us today has something in it for everyone, and it’s not often that we can say that.”
The committee’s vote came more than a year after Trump negotiated the initial version of the deal, which would replace the 1993 North American Free Trade Agreement.
Democrats argued that the nearly yearlong negotiations over it in the House vastly improved the initial Trump administration’s initial version of the deal that was negotiated with Mexico and Canada. The House passed the bill in December.
[Read: Six times Trump’s USMCA trade deal nearly died in 2019]
“This deal is more Trumka than Trump,” said Sen. Maria Cantwell, a Washington Democrat, referring to AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka. The labor leader was involved in the House negotiations and was credited by Democrats with improving the deal.
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, a Rhode Island Democrat, opposed the deal, saying it “breaks his heart” that it doesn’t include stronger environmental provisions.
Pennsylvania Sen. Pat Toomey, a pro-free trade Republican, opposed the deal as a step backward because it included some new restrictions on trade. He argued that the House’s alterations to the initial version of the deal violated the terms of the Trade Promotion Act, the law that covers submitting trade deals to Congress. Grassley overruled him.
