'Yay!': How the Canadians won the argument that opened the door to a NAFTA deal
'There was [on Saturday] a sense things were falling into place' - Trudeau
After months of what had been described as "continuous negotiations," a crucial breakthrough materialized Saturday a major concession by the U.S. team that made it easier for the Canadians to get to 'yes' on a new trilateral trade deal.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's closest advisers and the country's top trade bureaucratwere huddled together around a speakerphone in the office of his chief of staff, Katie Telford. U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) Robert Lighthizerwas on the line. They listened as the American trade diplomat made his pitch, the mute button securely in the 'on' position.
Lighthizer has developed a reputation in trade circles as a protectionist and, in the vein of other conservative-minded Americans, a strong proponent of U.S. sovereignty in the face of the globalizing effect of institutions like the UN and the World Trade Organization (WTO). Trump himself said Monday he picked Lighthizer as his trade czar because of his 'America First' instincts on trade.
So when Lighthizer agreed to a longstanding Canadian demand to preserve Chapter 19 of the original NAFTA,in its entirety a dispute settlement mechanism that Lighthizerpersonally loathesthe Canadians gathered in Telford's office gasped, senior government sources told CBC News.
Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland, Canada's political lead on the file, threw her hands up in the air and shouted, "Yay!"
The others in the room Canada's Ambassador to the U.S.David MacNaughton; Telford; Gerry Butts, the prime minister's principal secretary; John Hannaford, the prime minister's foreign and defence policy adviser; Steve Verheul, Canada's top trade negotiator; and Jeremy Broadhurst, Freeland's chief of staff were equallyelated at the prospect of U.S. intransigence on this chapter a dispute resolution mechanism that also wascrucial to securing Canada's signature on the original NAFTA melting away.
It wasn't the first time Freelandhad expressed her relief at securing a concession with that sort of physical display of glee. She had done it many times before.
But this was a pivotal moment. For 14 months, Lighthizer had made preserving Chapter 19 appear very unlikely. With the dispute settlement mechanism secure, the Canadians knew they were on the cusp of pulling together a new NAFTA.
Other, less controversial chaptershad been written up and agreed to weeks before. It was the dispute mechanism, and the question of what the Canadian side would give up on supply management, that held up a deal to the very end.
Sources toldCBC News the Chapter 19 breakthrough was the "turning point in all this."
The Canadians were never entirely sure the Americans were serious about getting a trilateral trade deal. For most of his adult life, Trump has railed against NAFTAand treaties like it,loudly proclaiming hisbelief that the U.S. has been hosed on tradeby its supposed allies. Lighthizer also has described NAFTA as a deal that had "fundamentally failed many, many Americans."
A reversal of this sort showed the Americans were serious about replacing NAFTA with something.Canada had said all along that ditching Chapter 19 was a red line they simply would not cross.
After the Telford group ended the call with Lighthizer, they placed another call to the PM to give him the news:a deal looked close.
'Ah-ha moment'
"I think we have all been through moments over the course of the negotiations where we felt very close, only to see it not end up working out ... I have to say, from my own perspective, there wasn't a single 'ah-ha' moment. There was just a series of, 'OK, we got this one settled. Wow. We have to talk about this one,'" Trudeau said, describing the process.
"But there was [on Saturday] a sense things were falling into place. I think one of the moments for me was when we realized we had an intact Chapter 19. That's where I started to think, 'OK, we're going to be able to get to a place,' because we kept in place the rules that protect trade and enforce trade agreements like this."
From the outset, the Canadians sought assurances that a new agreement would preserve Chapter 19 of the original NAFTA, a dispute resolution mechanism the countries can turn to if they feel wronged by the imposition of an anti-dumping or countervailing duty.
Canada has successfullychallenged U.S. actions on the softwood lumber file in the past through Chapter 19.
"When we began the work of updating NAFTA, we kept our focus on what really matters," Trudeau said.
CBC's Paul Hunter asks Trump about his relationship withTrudeau now:
"The new agreement would need to preserve jobs, foster growth, expand the middle class and support people working hard to join the middle class. It also needed to be fair.
"Which meant that it would have to preserve the fundamental principle of the original agreement, which is that when your trading partner is 10 times your size,you need rules. You need a level playing field."
Lighthizer, for his part, steadfastly opposed retaining Chapter 19, arguing that it constitutes a violation of U.S. sovereignty to have a multinational panel of arbiters decide on the acceptability of U.S. tariffs.
He relented as the deadline his boss came up with midnight Sunday drew nearer. The U.S. wanted to get a text to Congress so that leaders could sign it before Mexican PresidentEnrique Pea Nieto's term comes to an end on Dec. 1.
After that concession, of course,it was time for the Canadians to give the Americans and Trump specificallywhat they really wanted all along: greater U.S. access to Canada's dairy market to placate swing-state voters in places like Wisconsin and upstate New York, where farmers are awash in an oversupply of milk.
And while there was talk of clashing personalities (Trump said last week that his people basically didn'tlike Freeland or her negotiating tactics),MacNaughton saida deal was reached ultimately because of Lighthizer'spersonal "professionalism."
"It's been a long, exhaustive period. We used to go to bed at midnight and get up and be back at work at 7 a.m. and these issues are really intense, so sometimes there are tempers lost and everything else," he said in an interview withCBC'sPower & Politics.
"But I gotta tell you, the professionalism at the table on the part of Ambassador Lighthizer and Jared Kushner and, on our side, Minister Freeland, Steve Verheul, itwas really something."
Lighthizeralsothanked Kushner, the president's son-in-law, saying a deal would not have been possible without his interventions.
Kushner wason the other end of many calls from Butts and others in the prime minister's inner circle when talks soured.
Chapter 19, and the deal itself, still came at a price for Canada.
Under the United States-Mexico-Canada agreement (USMCA),the U.S. will have moreaccess to the Canadian dairy market than what the Trudeau government gave up earlier this yearwhen it signed the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), a trade deal with 10 Asia-Pacific countries.
With that agreement, those 10 countries will have market access that equals 3.25 per cent of Canada's annual milk production. The Americans will havemore: 3.6 per cent.
Perhaps most importantly for dairy producers, Canada has agreed to end what's calledclass 7 pricing, a milk class created in March 2017 thatslashed prices on some Canadian-produced milk ingredients like protein concentrates, skim milk and whole milk powder used to make cheese and yogurt.
Dairy farmers were already warning Monday that without the 18 month-old pricing scheme, the viability of the industry is in question.
Ultimately, the prime minister and his team decided that preserving much of the tariff-free access Canadian companies currently enjoy with the U.S. access worth more than $700 billion US a year was worth the sacrifice. But not without Chapter 19.
Corrections
- A previous version of this story said Jeremy Broadhurst is the prime minister's deputy chief of staff. In fact, he is the chief of staff to Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland.Oct 01, 2018 6:53 PM ET
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