[CTC] Wyden knocks USTR on NAFTA process; Neal wants Lighthizer on the Hill

[Arthur Stamoulis]

INSIDE US TRADE

Wyden knocks USTR on NAFTA process; Neal wants Lighthizer on the Hill
October 04, 2017
Top trade panel Democrats want the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative to step up consultations with them on NAFTA negotiations, with Ways & Means Committee ranking member Richard Neal (D-MA) readying a formal request for USTR Robert Lighthizer and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross to brief the committee before the next round of talks begins.
“I suggested today to Sandy Levin [MI] that it’s time to have Wilbur Ross and ambassador Lighthizer come in and give us a briefing next week if we can get him here to talk about where things are going,” Neal told Inside U.S. Trade on Oct. 4, referring to his fellow Ways & Means Democrat.
The formal request to Lighthizer and Ross was in process, Neal said Wednesday afternoon.
On the other side of the Capitol, Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Ron Wyden (D-OR) told Inside U.S. Trade USTR was not adequately consulting Congress on the NAFTA talks. Wyden said he had raised the issue with USTR but would not elaborate on that discussion.
Neal, asked if his desire for Lighthizer and Ross to brief the committee stemmed from a sense of subpar consultations thus far, said, “they go back to serious negotiations again next week. I think we should have some idea where this is headed.”
The fourth round of NAFTA talks is set for Oct. 11-15 in the Washington, DC, area, and Lighthizer has tasked his team to have all text ready to be tabled by then. The U.S. to date has not tabled controversial proposals on rules of origin, dispute settlement and investment, but sources said they expect USTR to table text in these areas despite pushback the proposals have received from other agencies and some lawmakers.
Neal added that he receives “periodic updates” from Ross and Lighthizer, but said it would be “good for all the members of the Ways & Means Committee to get an update now.”
Wyden, meanwhile, said the “reality is that trade is one of those areas that requires hands-on, constant consultation. And too often their version of consultation is to make their own decision and when they’ve made their decision and are on their way to announce it they call you about it.”
“That is not my definition of consultation,” he added. “Consultation is when you sit around before you’ve made your decision.”
Ways & Means Trade Subcommittee Chairman Dave Reichert (R-WA), however, said he believes USTR is doing a sufficient job in consulting with Congress on the NAFTA renegotiation. Trade Promotion Authority law, he added, “of course legally requires them to work with us in any trade agreement.”
Asked how the NAFTA talks were going, Reichert told Inside U.S. Trade “they’re going.”
“Our message has always been to the administration that ‘look, if you want to get anything moving in Congress you have to work with us,’” he said.
Sources have said USTR’s consultations with lawmakers and the private sector on NAFTA proposals have been lacking, although some have attributed that to a combination of extremely quick turnaround times between negotiating rounds and USTR’s desire to table large numbers of proposals at each one. Other sources, however, do not view those as acceptable reasons for allegedly skirting statutory guidelines for consultations laid out in TPA.
Lighthizer and his team in some instances have opted to move forward with proposals and shared text with congressional staff without having the proposals cleared by other agencies, which some sources said was a sign that the interagency process was “broken <https://insidetrade.com/node/160409>.”
Inside U.S. Trade has learned that USTR last week attempted to limit congressional staff access to trade advisory committee comments on NAFTA proposals in an attempt to “control the process more,” as one source put it.
The source said the limited access to industry input would make it harder for congressional staff and lawmakers to formulate arguments against certain proposals.
USTR has faced opposition from the “big four” leaders of the trade committees as well as interagency pushback on a number of proposals, including a sunset clause and text on investment, dispute settlement and rules of origin.
Lighthizer, however, told reporters at the third round of talks last week that “all the provisions we’ve put forward are unified administration proposals, one hundred percent, every one without exception <https://insidetrade.com/node/160419>.”
Asked about ISDS and the sunset clause, for which text was not tabled at the third round in Ottawa last week, Lighthizer said “When we put them forward they’ll be unified too.”
Senate Agriculture Chairman Pat Roberts (R-KS) told Inside U.S. Trade he does not know why the administration is pushing for such a clause given that the current agreement includes terms of withdrawal.
“I’m not for that,” Roberts said of the proposal, which would allow for a review and potential termination of the deal after five years. “If something goes wrong you can always come back.” Lighthizer, he said, “knows how I feel about it and I think all the aggies are weighing in.
“Anything that comes out of the White House I take very seriously,” Roberts continued, “but we just have to weigh in on behalf of farmers and ranchers and say ‘what’s it going to do to the trade agreement?’”
Reichert said the sunset clause was “an issue that’s going to create some dialogue.”
On rules of origin -- and a U.S. proposal on autos that could disrupt North American supply chains due to U.S. demands for higher regional value content, as well as a domestic U.S. content requirement -- Reichert said “that’s one of the issues that we have to continue to talk about.”
Several sources have questioned the administration’s seriousness in seeking congressional approval for its NAFTA 2.0 deal -- and wondered which members of Congress the administration was courting with certain proposals that do not appear to have strong support on either side of the aisle.
One source said it would be “very difficult” for Lighthizer,  “in any meaningful way,” to complete negotiations that would signal a change from current U.S. trade policy because Mexico and Canada will refuse to support such a deal and Republican lawmakers “will do their best to block it.”
Another source said the Trump administration has no leverage when tabling controversial proposals if it doesn’t have the support of lawmakers -- and the other countries are aware that the U.S. Congress is “notoriously opposed.”
“You don’t get to act unilaterally other than tabling it,” the source said. “That’s one thing the administration will be reminded of.”
Wyden said insufficient consultation with lawmakers could endanger support in Congress for a new NAFTA, if a deal is reached.
“I continue to believe if you want to get the Congress --  and as you know trade now does not fit into a neat political box -- you gotta play a hands-on, constantly consulting kind of effort,” he said.
Reichert said there was “still dialogue that needs to occur; there’s a lot of things we need to discuss before we can move anything up. You know what happened to TPP -- members weren’t happy with some of the issues and so it died.”
“So the message is to the administration: You need to work with us; we’ll find a way forward,” he added. “But you need Congress to be a part of that effort.” -- Jack Caporal (jcaporal at iwpnews.com <mailto:jcaporal at iwpnews.com>) and Jenny Leonard(jleonard at iwpnews.com <mailto:jleonard at iwpnews.com>)

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