“If we can’t make a deal, it’ll be terminated, and that’ll be fine,” Trump said in the brief meeting with the prime minister Wednesday. Trump again floated the possibility that Mexico could be dumped from the three-country pact in favour of a two-way deal with Canada.
WASHINGTON—U.S. President Donald Trump sent more vague signals on the North American Free Trade Agreement before a meeting with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Wednesday.
Speaking beside Trudeau in the Oval Office, Trump hailed their “great personal relationship” but was noncommittal in response to every question about NAFTA.
“We’ll see what happens. It’s possible we won’t be able to make a deal and it’s possible that we will,” Trump said.
He proceeded to waver between mild professions of optimism and another mention of his comfort with the possibility that the agreement will be terminated.
“We have a great personal relationship, and we have a relationship now as two countries I think that’s as close as ever. But we’ll see if we can do the kind of changes that we need. We have to protect our workers, and in all fairness, the prime minister wants to protect Canada and his people also. So we’ll see what happens with NAFTA. But I’ve been opposed to NAFTA for a long time in terms of the fairness of NAFTA. I said we’ll renegotiate.
“And I think Justin understands that if we can’t make a deal, it’ll be terminated, and that’ll be fine,” he said. “They’re going to do well, we’re going to do well. But maybe that won’t be necessary. But it has to be fair to both countries.”
Trump has long expressed a preference for two-way deals rather than multi-way deals. On Wednesday, he again floated the possibility that Mexico could be dumped from the three-country pact.