At a hearing in Washington focused on the future of CUSMA, Trump claimed Mexico and Canada have 'taken advantage of the United States like just about every other country.' The hearing saw U.S. agriculture, business and policy groups urging the Trump administration not to scrap the agreement.

Washington

Public hearings have started in Washington to gather input on whether to renew, renegotiate, or withdraw from the Canada-US-Mexico trade agreement (KUSMA) ahead of its 2026 review. Former US President Donald Trump commented that Canada and Mexico have 'taken advantage' of the US, but did not specify if he supports renewing the deal.

Industry representatives, particularly from agriculture, testified in favor of extending the agreement, citing its benefits to their sectors. The US trade representative is expected to report to Congress by early January, with a final decision on the deal's future anticipated by July 1st of the following year.

Trump claims Canada, Mexico have taken advantage of the U.S.

Key stakeholders are making their pitches this week on the three-way trade deal between Canada, the United States and Mexico. The hearings play a big part in Washington's public consultation about whether to renew the KUSMA agreement in 2026. Renegotiate it or withdraw? Mike Crowley is on this story. He joins us now from Washington. Mike, let's start with the current state of this review process. Where does it stand? Look, Sarah, if trade talks were a sport, this is kind of the warm-up or maybe training phase. You've got all three countries that are in KUSMA, or the USMCA as they call it here in Washington. They're right now gathering information and input from the public to prepare for July 1st of next year. That's the date when the US, Canada and Mexico each have to say what their position is on extending the trade deal or making a bunch of changes to it. Now, today was the first day of the US's public hearings into the agreement, and while that was happening this afternoon, over in one part of Washington, at the White House, just a couple blocks from here, Donald Trump was asked for his position on renegotiating the deal. Here's what he had to say. You know, that's just an ongoing thing. It expires in about a year, and we'll either let it expire or we'll maybe work out another deal with Mexico and Canada. But, look, Mexico and Canada have taken advantage of the United States, like just about every other country in all fairness, so it's not them. I'm not blaming them. So, what you didn't hear Trump talk about there was renewing the trade deal, and we don't know how much his position is going to be swayed at all by what all of these industry groups are saying here in Washington at these hearings. Key stakeholders are testifying on this deal through this week. You were listening to some of that. What are they saying? Yeah, there's nearly 150 people, Sarah, that are set to testify this week, and they represent basically every sector of the US economy that you can think of. Today was heavily weighted towards the agricultural sector, but you had speaker after speaker after speaker telling the hearing that the agreement, the Canada-US-Mexico agreement, has benefited their industry. It's given them opportunities to boost their revenue, how they absolutely want it extended. You had almond growers, berry farmers, corn growers, soybean producers, you name it. They don't want the Trump administration to walk away from the deal, and some of them even went so far today, is to say that Trump's tariffs on Canadian and Mexican exports are jeopardising the preferential access that they get through KUSMA to the markets in Canada and Mexico, because there's this risk that either of these countries could retaliate. Alice Slayton-Clark, she's with something called the US Council for International Business, she's testifying tomorrow at the hearing, and she told CBC News that the companies in her organisation believe that KUSMA has worked really well. There's a lot in this agreement that we really consider high standard and we'd like to see preserved. You know, everything could be subject to some tweaking and corrections, but we do not want to see any sort of bogged down negotiation that would undermine or jeopardise this agreement in the long term. Now, I should mention that the US dairy sector does want to see KUSMA renewed, but did say some critical things about how Canada's implementing the agreement by limiting access to the Canadian market instead of approving it. But that was honestly, Sarah, the sharpest criticism of Canada that I heard all day. Well, then, Mike, so where does the deal go from here? Yeah, so you've got two more days of public hearings here in the US and then the US trade representative has to report to Congress by the beginning of January about what he heard in all this public input and what he recommends about renewing the agreement. Who knows what that position will be, but it's going to kick off the run-up to July 1st, the official date when, you know, the US is going to announce whether it's renewing or wanting to rewrite the deal. And so, in the meantime, you've got backers of the deal in the US that has some advice for Canada about how to approach it. What Canada needs to focus on, what Mexico needs to focus on, is making this a win for the president. So, looking at areas of cooperation, whether that's critical minerals, whether that's energy cooperation, and hopefully coming out the other side, we can reduce and remove the tariffs that are in place and restore, you know, the predictability that the business community needs and renew this agreement. So, Sarah, the big question really is, is Trump going to potentially use the threat of withdrawing from the deal, walking away from it, as some kind of leverage in the negotiations? And there's plenty of analysts warning Canada that we've got to be prepared for that.

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Breakdown