PHARR, RGV - U.S. Sen. John Cornyn and U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar are confident that a successor trade agreement to NAFTA will be ratified by Congress this fall.
The two lawmakers were panelists a USMCA forum hosted by the Rio Grande Valley Partnership and Futuro RGV. The forum was held at the Pharr Events Center and the panel was moderated by UT-Rio Grande Valley Vice President Veronica Gonzales.
In his remarks, Cuellar note that the U.S. does $1.7 billion of trade with Mexico each day, which works out at $1 million a minute. The Laredo Democrat dismissed thoughts that Democrats on Capitol Hill would oppose the United States-Mexico-Canada (USMCA) trade agreement in order to give a black eye to President Trump.
“This has nothing to do with Trump. When it comes to trade it is all personal to the district,” Cuellar said.
“I feel very confident we will have a vote and we will pass it. I have counted the votes on the Democratic side. I feel very confident once we put it to a vote, it will pass.”
Cuellar acknowledged that some of his Democratic colleagues in the House may oppose USMCA because of the position of organized labor. He said he knows what pressure from organized labor is like because came he was in its crosshairs for supporting the CAFTA deal in 2005.
However, he said, “no member has ever lost an election on trade. That his what I keep telling members. This fall we will put it to a vote and it will pass.”
In his remarks, Cornyn said:
“Trade has undeservedly, in my view, gotten a little bit of a black eye in our political discourse these days. People blame a lot of things on trade that it doesn’t deserve. This has been an unadulterated good thing for the United States, NAFTA. Five million American jobs depend on binational trade with Mexico, eight million with Canada.”
Asked about potential opposition to USMCA from the AFL-CIO, Cornyn said Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer has worked hard to accommodate the views of trade unions.
“I agree with Henry that the president and the trade representative have been respectful of Speaker Pelosi’s position. She has to work the House and there is nobody who knows it better than she does. I agree with Henry that if they key it up in the House, which I have heard him say they will do, and it passes, then it will pass the Senate,” Cornyn said.
However, Cornyn issued this warning: “The closer it gets to the election the more difficult the environment gets politically. We need to get this done.”
Cuellar noted that the AFL-CIO has not officially said “no” to USMCA. “They are trying to get to a yes,” he said.
Cornyn responded: “Sometimes, neutrality is a good position.”
The moderator, UTRGV’s Gonzales, asked Cornyn to respond to concerns from McAllen Economic Development Corporation President Keith Patridge that businesses are holding back on investments at the border due to uncertainty over USMCA. Patridge had been part of an earlier panel at the USMCA forum.
Cornyn responded: “Business confidence is really important because investors are not going to make decisions if they cannot plan or think circumstances might radically change. The good news is that NAFTA is the law of the land until it is replaced. I think that will provide some comfort. In this environment it is so easy to get distracted by the latest statement or tweet or cable news story. Part of it is trying to keep your eye on the ball. That is I think we ought to do and not get distracted by all the noise that exists now in Washington, D.C., on this topic in particular.”
Cornyn said there could be two big success stories coming out of Congress this fall. In addition to passage of USMCA, he said the Highway Trust Fund, otherwise known as the Highway Bill, could win approval. The legislation authorizes an increase in highway funding of 27 percent.
Cornyn noted that the Senate Finance Committee is looking at ways to pay for the highway bill. He said the highways fuel tax is inadequate to meet transportation infrastructure needs
"We are coming up with some creative funding mechanisms that are getting acceptance. There is a better than even chance we might pass a highway bill as well,” Cornyn said.
Cuellar agreed about the importance of the highway bill. He pointed out that 80 percent of transportation funding comes from the federal government.
“We do need this highway bill. It is not just the people, it is about cargo. There is no other place like Texas when it comes to trade. We have got to make sure we put in the dollars, not only for the highways but also the Harbor Maintenance Tax.”
Cuellar said land ports of entry ought to look at creating their version of the Harbor Trust Fund that sea ports have. He said land ports of entry are $5 billion short of what they require for infrastructure improvements. He said he would rather see that amount of money spent on land ports of entry than a border wall.
Cuellar said what worries him about hostility in the United States to free trade agreements is that China is ready to step in and fill the void. He noted that that Mexico has 45 free trade agreements. “We are not the only game in town,” he said.
By way of example, he mentioned that China is now looking to Argentina and Brazil for soya beans whereas previously it purchased them in large quantities from the United States.
Cuellar said he and other House members recently returned from a trip to El Salvador. While he was there they learned that China had offered to by buy 63 percent of El Salvador’s coast. To sweeten the deal it was offering El Salvador 5G.
Cuellar said that Russia, Iran and, in particular, China, are making inroads into Latin American through trade deals. “In Chile, China is more popular than the United States,” Cuellar said. He noted that the Chinese have gone into Argentina offering to collaborate on a space-tracking project.
Cuellar said China was using old-fashioned diplomacy in Latin America, offering to build hospitals in return from access to the market. “If we are not careful we will lose them (Latin American countries),” Cuellar said.
Noting that 95 percent of NAFTA is remaining in place in USMCA, Cuellar said he wished the United States had stayed in the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
“We could have had a NAFTA 2.0 through TPP. When we got out of TPP, what happened? The only one that was happy about this was China because we left about 40 or 50 percent of the world’s market to China.”
Cuellar added that Vietnamese officials had told him that the United States has forgotten about them. He said he thought the officials were talking about military support but they were, in fact, talking about TPP.
Cornyn agreed that dropping out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership was not a smart move.
“The one thing America has that China does not have is friends. They are aggressively stealing our intellectual property. They do not play by the same rules,” Cornyn said.
“It is a missed opportunity and I hope we have a chance to revisit it, the TPP, because that is the best thing to provide note assistance to our friends and our allies but also to contain a China on the march.”
