© Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty ImagesMexican President Enrique Pena Nieto, President Donald Trump and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau deliver a statement on the signing of a new free trade agreement in Buenos Aires, on Friday on the sidelines of the G20 Leaders' Summit.
North American leaders formally signed their new trade agreement Friday, marking the end of 15 months of contentious talks between the U.S., Canada and Mexico - and the beginning of what could be months of fierce debate between the Trump administration and Congress.
The signing, which took place on the sidelines of the G-20 summit, shifts the onus onto each country's legislatures to approve the agreement before it can actually take effect. And that could be a problem in the U.S., where some Democrats have already been opposing the labor and environmental provisions in the pact, now known as the U.S.-Mexico-Canada agreement or USMCA.
Despite a push by a handful of Republican senators to vote on the agreement during the lame-duck session, procedural hurdles make it almost certain there won't be a vote until sometime next year when Democrats are controlling the House. That's jeopardizing President Donald Trump's chances of fulfilling what has been a signature pledge of his presidency.
Trump expressed confidence Friday that the pact would sail through Congress. "It's been so well-reviewed, I don't expect to have very much of a problem," he said as he stood onstage in a hotel conference room next to Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Trump called the trade deal "a truly groundbreaking achievement" before the three leaders sat down at a table and signed it.
But it actually remains far from certain that the agreement would pass the two chambers, particularly in its current form. Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren on Thursday added her voice to a groundswell of opposition from Democrats in the House and Senate who have been complaining about the new deal's labor standards and what they see as a lack of enforceability of new provisions. The liberal firebrand denounced the agreement as written, saying it wouldn't prevent outsourcing or raise wages.
On the other side of the aisle, House Republicans have also launched their own wave of criticism, largely centered on new provisions that aim to prevent discrimination on the basis of sex, including sexual orientation and gender identity.
The agreement is also under fire from the GOP in the Senate, where some free-trade-oriented Republicans say it limits trading opportunities rather than promotes them.
U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer ruled out any possibility that the pact would be reopened now that it's been signed. But he acknowledged that the administration could emphasize certain things in the implementing legislation and include provisions to address lawmakers' concerns to win their support.
"I've been in discussions with a variety of Democratic leaders on those points and they'll be very much involved in the process moving forward and will have an influence, a strong influence," Lighthizer told reporters in Buenos Aires on Friday.
"I want them not only to vote for it, I want them to be happy with the agreement," he added.
It's unclear whether any changes in the implementing bill will go far enough to appease lawmakers. Democrats who are pushing for stronger labor and environmental standards, for example, take issue with those provisions in the original NAFTA because they were not written into the core text of the agreement but rather in side deals that critics felt aren't enforceable.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said Friday that his caucus would be willing to work toward a compromise.
The New York Democrat blasted the labor and environmental provisions in the USMCA as its currently written as "too weak" and said the deal would have to "prove to be a net benefit to middle-class families and working people in our country" in order to win the congressional support it needs to pass.
But, he added, "thankfully, the Congress has a role in crafting 'implementing legislation' to make sure the deal benefits and protects middle-class families and working people and isn't simply a rebranding of the same old policies that hurt our economy and workers for years."
At the same time, the Trump administration is also continuing to work out a deal for Canada and Mexico to earn exemptions from steel and aluminum tariffs, potentially in exchange for quotas. The expectation had initially been for those details to be worked out before the negotiations concluded, and then before the pact was signed. But the Trump administration has long emphasized that the two issues needed to be worked out on separate tracks, and its two NAFTA partners ultimately agreed to go ahead with the signing given the importance of the trading relationship.
Lighthizer declined to give any specifics on which options were on the table but said that any deal would not undermine the administration's goal of revitalizing the U.S. steel and aluminum industries.
"I'm hoping that we come to a conclusion before long with respect to both countries," he said. "We're not going to take a pause. We're going ... to continue that negotiation."
Reaching an agreement to remove the steel and aluminum duties - as well as those Canada and Mexico imposed in retaliation on billions of dollars worth of agricultural and other products - is likely to be a vital step before the new NAFTA will be approved.
A number of domestic industries, from auto companies to pork producers, have made their case repeatedly that any benefits of the USMCA are far outweighed by the negative impact of the ongoing tariffs.
In a statement applauding the USMCA signing, the Business Roundtable also called for a "prompt resolution" to the steel and aluminum tariff issue "to ensure a stronger trading relationship." The Global Automakers, meanwhile, called it "unfathomable" that the metals tariffs had "not been resolved in the context of these negotiations."
Trudeau also needled Trump about removing the tariffs at the signing ceremony, highlighting news this week of widespread General Motors layoffs across the continent that will lead to the lost of nearly 14,000 jobs.
"Donald, it's all the more reason that we keep working to remove the tariffs on steel and aluminum between our countries," Trudeau said.
Comment: Tariffs did the job in sparking momentum for the NAFTA revision. Trump understands how to get and focus attention. The harsher the prod, the more timely the response and solution.