Trump hints at NAFTA withdrawal, says Mexico will pay for wall

NAFTA is an agreement signed by Canada, Mexico and the U.S. to create a trilateral trade bloc in North America. Trump made his remarks at a rally in Phoenix Tuesday night.

Trump tweeted on Sunday that he wasn’t pleased with how negotiations over NAFTA are going, saying Mexico and Canada were “being very hard”.

“We don’t think it would be the right path or a viable path to terminate the agreement just when we’re in negotiations”, he added.

The mayor of the Canadian city of Hamilton has rushed to the defense of his country after President Donald Trump took a shot at Canada’s trade relations with the U.S.

“With Mexico being one of the highest crime nations in the world”, he wrote, “we must have THE WALL. They’ve had it their way”, Trump said on Monday.

Ricketts said he has spoken directly with U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer about the value of benefits flowing to Nebraska, providing “feedback directly into the administration”. Read the full analysis here.

Carlos Gonzalez Gutierrez, the Mexican consul general in Austin, also confirmed that the country was as committed as ever to helping Texas, even in spite of Trump’s inflammatory rhetoric.

Guajardo has previously estimated a 60 percent chance the talks would be wrapped up by an ambitious soft deadline for January, a date Mexico said was important to avoid the talks becoming politicised ahead of its July presidential election.

“To walk away from that or to walk away from our commitments I think would lead to a trade war where no one would win”, Hill said.

The mayor of Hamilton, Ontario, was quick to fire back at Trump’s take on NAFTA and Canada and responded to the President on Twitter. “And that’s another reason we need it”, he said.

Nathaniel Parish Flannery: As the trade talks begin between the three NAFTA partners how much distance does there seem to be between the goals of the participants?

Trump has repeatedly called the agreement a “disaster” that exported United States jobs to Mexico, while Mexico has dismissed his rhetoric as a negotiating tactic playing to his U.S. base.

Wise said Trump is “not entirely wrong” about NAFTA causing US manufacturing job losses, but said “what he’s wrong about is he can fix that problem by withdrawing from NAFTA”.