Renew CUSMA, Canada urges as U.S. separates meetings and talks ramp up

Canada is asking the U.S. and Mexico to renew the current Canada-U.S.-Mexico Free Trade Agreement (CUSMA) for another 16 years as negotiations move forward.

Canada-U.S. Trade Minister Dominic LeBlanc penned a letter to his counterparts in the U.S. and Mexico, which was released on Tuesday.

“This Agreement is highly beneficial to each of our countries and to the integrated North American economy,” Leblanc said in the letter.

“The growth and success brought forward by our historic trilateral trade agreement is why I am confirming that Canada recommends renewal of the agreement for another sixteen years.”

The United States is engaging in “bifurcated” trade talks with both Canada and Mexico as the review deadline for renewed talks on CUSMA approaches next month, Prime Minister Mark Carney said on Tuesday morning.

U.S. negotiators have issues with both Canada and Mexico, Carney said, that they plan to navigate separately.

“There’s a series of issues, technical issues, that they have with Mexico, they have with us, which is why there’s a bifurcated discussion,” Carney told reporters ahead of a cabinet meeting in Ottawa Tuesday.

Washington has raised “30 issues or so” with Canada and almost 60 with Mexico, Carney added.

Under the current framework, the same agreement regulates all free trade between all three countries, dictating virtually all trade on the continent.

Trade negotiations with the U.S. are set to continue as LeBlanc travels to Washington on Tuesday to meet with his American counterpart.

Canada and the U.S. are still without a clear agreement to either renew or replace CUSMA, and this is part of the trade talks between Ottawa and Washington ahead of the mandatory review of the agreement by July 1.

The U.S. and Mexico already completed their first round of bilateral negotiations last week, and more discussions are scheduled for later this month.

The CUSMA review sets up a three-way choice for each country to make. They can renew the deal for another 16 years, withdraw from it or signal both non-renewal and non-withdrawal — which would trigger an annual review that could keep negotiations going for up to a decade.

LeBlanc’s spokesperson, Gabriel Brunet, said the minister will be joined by Chief Trade Negotiator Janice Charette for a meeting with U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer.

Earlier Monday, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre accused Carney of “hiding from the negotiating table for the last six months while the Mexicans have been eating our lunch.”

He said he has no expectations that LeBlanc’s meeting with Greer will achieve anything.

— with files from The Canadian Press