‘It’s all going to be OK,’ Canada’s U.S. ambassador says ahead of CUSMA deadline

Joy Nott, partner on trade and customs at KPMG, joins BNN Bloomberg to discuss CUSMA and Canada-U.S. trade talks.

With the deadline for Canada, the United States and Mexico to either renew or review their trilateral trade deal just two weeks away, Canadian Ambassador to the U.S. Mark Wiseman is urging people not to stress.

“Everybody take a deep breath, relax, it’s all going to be OK,” he said Monday during a fireside chat with BMO Financial Group CEO Darryl White at the Canadian Club Toronto.

By July 1, officials in all three countries must notify their counterparts whether they want to renew the Canada-U.S. Mexico Agreement (CUSMA) for a 16-year period or agree to an annual review process.

In his remarks on Monday, Wiseman highlighted what other Canadian officials and negotiators have said: the July 1 deadline is not “a cliff,” and despite a review process, the deal stays in place.

“No one, including Ambassador (Jamieson) Greer, the U.S. trade representative (USTR), or the president, have suggested that they would intend to cancel the agreement,” said Wiseman, who’s been Canada’s top diplomat in Washington for four months to the day as of Monday. “In fact, quite the opposite.”

“The USTR has publicly come out, Ambassador Greer has publicly come out, and said that the U.S. — like Canada, like Mexico — wants to preserve those foundational pillars of the CUSMA agreement,” Wiseman added.

In a letter to his counterparts in the U.S. and Mexico earlier this month, Canada-U.S. Trade Minister Dominic LeBlanc said he wants to renew the trade deal for another 16 years and opt out of an annual review process.

U.S. President Donald Trump, meanwhile, speaking from the Oval Office last week, said he’s “not looking to renew it,” adding the U.S. doesn’t “need anything Canada has.”

During his fireside chat, Wiseman echoed statements made by LeBlanc in his letter, saying despite wanting to renew CUSMA, Canada is focused on finding a way through Trump’s sectoral tariffs.

Canada and the U.S. have been in a protracted trade war for more than a year, after Trump imposed a slate of tariffs on Canadian imports. While the vast majority of products are tariff-free because they’re covered under CUSMA, several sectoral levies are still in place.

“Those tariffs are the ones that are biting in terms of impact on the Canadian economy, Canadian business, Canadian workers,” Wiseman said. “And those sectoral tariffs are sitting outside and are arguably in violation of CUSMA.”

The ambassador said while the July 1 deadline is less important in the broader context of the free-trade agreement, Canadian officials are focused on reaching a deal “as quickly and effectively” as possible, to get some relief on the sectoral tariffs that are “hurting.”

Wiseman and White also discussed Canada’s trade diversification, with the former saying those efforts are not necessarily at the expense of trade with the United States.

Trump arrived in Geneva, Switzerland, on Monday for the G7 Leaders’ Summit, though there is no bilateral meeting scheduled between him and Prime Minister Mark Carney, who is also attending the conference.