Update on USMCA

Rick Worthington

The United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement is also known as USMCA. The USMCA is set to replace the North American Free Trade Agreement, better known as NAFTA... That is IF it's ever passed by congress.

And the clock is ticking, the U.S. Congress has a handful of working days left on the calendar this year.

The NCBA's CEO Colin Woodall says - it's key the legislation be passed soon. If it's not, it could be a long time before it comes back up.

"Election years are really tough to get a lot of legislation passed. They're even tougher in presidential election years, which, of course is what we have coming up. So we believe that if we're not successful in getting things done here by the end of the year, our chances of getting them done before the election are pretty slim. And top of mind and leading that list by far is ratification passage of U.S. DMCA, something that we have been working very closely with the Trump administration. We've been working very closely with the Canadians and the Mexicans as well. And now it is up to Congress to get this thing done."

The President has been pushing congress to act, but it's up to Speaker Nancy Pelosi to decide when something does or does not get a vote, and she so far hasn’t committed to a timetable.