Washington: US President Donald Trump abruptly ended the decades-old US tilt towards free trade by signing an executive order to withdraw from an Asia-Pacific accord that was never ratified and promising to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta).
“Great thing for the American worker, what we just did,” Trump said on Monday after signing an order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership accord with 11 other nations. He didn’t sign any actions to direct a renegotiation of the Nafta accord with Mexico and Canada, yet he said on Sunday he would begin talks with the two leaders on modifying the accord.
Trump’s trade focus fulfils a campaign promise to rewrite America’s trade policy during his first days as president. In declaring his determination to renegotiate Nafta, Trump would rework an agreement that has governed commerce in much of the Western hemisphere for 22 years.
By scrapping the Trans-Pacific Partnership accord negotiated by former President Barack Obama, Trump will delight many of his most fervent supporters as well as a good many Democrats, while opening an economic vacuum in Asia that China is eager to fill.
Trump campaigned against the TPP and other trade deals, including Nafta, during his campaign for the White House.
In a video released in November, Trump promised to exit TPP “on day one,” calling it “a potential disaster for our country.”
The TPP, a 12-country deal that sought to liberalise trade between the US and Pacific Rim nations including Japan, Mexico and Singapore, was a signature piece of former Obama’s attempt to pivot US global strategy to focus on the fast-growing economies of Asia.
Trump said Sunday that he’ll meet with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto to begin discussing Nafta, which he has routinely blamed for the loss of US jobs.
The newly sworn-in president praised Mexico for being “terrific” and signalled that he’s willing to work with the U.S.’s closest neighbours.
“We’re going to start renegotiating on Nafta, on immigration, and on security at the border,” Trump said at the start of a swearing-in ceremony for top White House staff. “I think we’re going to have a very good result for Mexico, for the United States, for everybody involved. It’s really very important.”
Officials in Canada, which is the biggest buyer of US exports, have indicated they want to avoid getting entangled with the Trump administration’s targeting of imports from Mexico and China. The three countries are the biggest trading partners of the US.
