President Trump has joined the leaders of Mexico and Canada to sign a revised North American trade deal. Trump gathered with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and outgoing Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto on the sidelines of Friday's G20 summit in Buenos Aires. The three sat a table, pens at the ready, spurred to sign with a "let's go" by Trump that was echoed by Trudeau and Pena Nieto. The revamped deal, which Trump calls the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement, or USMCA, will replace the North American Free Trade Agreement (aka NAFTA), which Trump has long raged against. He says the new agreement "changes the trade landscape forever," reports the AP.
Lawmakers in each country must now ratify the agreement. That could prove to be a difficult task in the US, especially now that Democrats will control the House of Representatives come January. Already Democrats and their allies in the labor movement are demanding changes. Trump spent more than a year pushing the leaders of Canada and Mexico into agreeing to this rewrite of North American trade rules. He noted to Trudeau that "it's been a battle," but battles sometimes make "great friendships."
(More
USMCA stories.)