Trump gets win on trade deal with Canada and Mexico

Photo: Getty images

Trade ministers from the U.S., Canada and Mexico have met Sunday's deadline and reached a trade deal on NAFTA [North American Free Trade Agreement] the Trump administration announced.

The new pact, known as the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMC-eh) is yet another promise kept by Trump and it gives him more 'cred' to brag about on the campaign trail in the fall. Of course, Congress is going to have to pass it before it becomes law, and with the obstructionists on the left, it's going to be a fight.

Robert Lighthizer, the U.S. Trade Representative, said in August that our officials are planning to sign the agreement with their counterparts in Mexico and Canada, and they wanted it done by the end of November to satisfy Mexico's President Enrique Peña Nieto who will leave office on December 1st.

"It's a great win for the president and a validation for his strategy in the area of international trade," a senior Trump official said via phone with the media on Sunday.

There are changes in language on the revamped deal regarding governing dairy imports, dispute resolution between the countries, limits on tax-free online shopping, and limits on the U.S. threat of auto tariffs.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin "Baby Face" Trudeau said late Sunday night, "It's a good day for Canada," adding that he would save other comments for Monday [after he is told by his staff what to say].

A formal vote will be held in 2019.

Republicans will likely pay close attention to the final details about dispute settlement and intellectual property issues, while Democrats will likely be looking to file charges of sex abuse on white male Republicans while looking for stricter labor and environmental standards.

Both parties, along with large business and industry groups, are also looking into whether new provisions, [e.g., stricter automotive rules] will make business more difficult for domestic companies rather than easier.

Canada has agreed to eliminate a milk-ingredient pricing program that U.S. farmers said had dried up demand for their exports of the product. In exchange, Canada was able to retain the dispute settlement language. The Canucks have historically insisted on an international panel to decide whether the U.S. improperly uses duties as a commercial weapon.

Canada also went along with the U.S. agreeing to an "accommodation" to their auto exports for national security concerns, the official said. This will probably mean that Canada will agree to a side deal with us that would restrict its auto exports to a level well above the current volume of trade flowing south of the border.

If the Democrats win the House in November, they may do all they can to go along with the deal, even at the expense of the country, because it gives President Trump credit.

Leading congressional Democrats say they aren't convinced the new deal represents a significant shift from past trade policies that they've rarely supported, and that President Trump ought to be impeached because Hillary Clinton should be President.

If it was up to the left, the deal would elevate worker's rights above those of management and allow them to vote on all major decisions. Workers who are the most intersectional, such as transgender black progressive Muslim illegal alien women will have a vote that carries the most weight.

But that's another story.


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Migrants symbolically 'flip the bird' to POTUS

Mission, Texas -- On the day President Trump announced that he planned to use the military to assist patrolling the U.S.-Mexico border, Edwin Valdez (no relation to Juan Valdez, the coffee maven) and four other migrants walked through dense brush on a south Texas wildlife reserve, hoping to sneak into the country unnoticed.

The hombres illegally crossed into the U.S. that morning with a human trafficker guiding them and eventually abandoning them. Lacking a GPS and a sense of direction, the men got lost and didn't know how to proceed.

Nearby, U.S. Border Patrol agents were alerted to migrants moving through the area, disproving Nancy Pelosi's "Just Cut the Grass" theory on how to keep illegal aliens on their side of the border. The agents found the men in the grass and swooped in to arrest them.

The illegal alien business was booming in the Rio Grande Valley one of the busiest crossing points for migrants trying to sneak into the U.S. The authorities rounded up 61 migrants, Valdez among them that morning. Ten migrants were caught with the use of a tracking dog in a sugar cane field. 

Several of the illegal migrants didn't care a fiddler's fart about Trump's tough talk about the border and his threat to end the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) unless Mexico intervenes to "stop the big drug and people flows."

Trump's frustration over border security was renewed over the weekend when he heard about the "caravan" of Central American migrants traveling through Mexico toward the U.S. border. The main issue President Trump was elected on was border security, and boy, was he upset about that caravan.

Months after he took office, the migrants caught along the border decreased significantly, hitting a record low of about 15,700 in April, well below the 42,400 in January 2017, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection data.

However, illegal aliens are making a comeback in sneaking into the country. In the first months of this year, arrests have reached levels close to those seen during the last year of "Open 'em Up" Obama.

Rising arrests of families and unaccompanied minors are of great concern because they are more difficult to send back to their countries.

Manuel Padilla, chief of the border patrol's Rio Grande Valley sector, spoke with Reuters and explained that families often walk right up to the first U.S. official they find and ask for help. This accounts for about 49 percent of all folks illegally crossing.

"It doesn't matter how many agents are out there," regarding families, Padilla said, when it comes to families, "because this population is turning themselves in."

Sounds as if they've been coached.

Back to 20-year-old Valdez. 

He worked as an electrician's assistant back home in El Salvador, and previously attempted to sneak into the U.S. illegally in 2016, but was picked up by border patrol officers. He was wandering lost and thirsty in the desert for four days--definitely not the sharpest knife on the Christmas tree.

After six months in detention, he was deported in 2017. However, he decided to try sneaking into the U.S. again after gangs threatened him at his job, he said. 

"Necessity forces people to leave their countries so they can bring a better life to their families," he said, attacking the liberal belief that the U.S.A. is a terrible country filled with terrible people who voted for Donald Trump. "That's why people are willing to suffer through all this." [And are willing to circumvent the rule of law for their own gains.]

After his arrest on Monday, he was searched by the arresting agents and then taken to a processing facility with his companions where he will receive "three hots and a cot," an exercise yard, and color TV.

Those previously deported are often quickly sent home. But illegal aliens traveling with small children often spend only a few days in custody and parents are usually released with an electronic ankle monitor and ordered to appear in court with their kids on a specific date for deportation proceedings. Trump doesn't like this practice, which he calls 'catch and release,' a term often used by fly fishermen who fish mainly for sport, not for food.

Another guy, Jose Romero, 27, tried to sneak into the U.S. along with his 8-year-old daughter. They hid in the back of a dark cargo truck. 

Back in his mountain home in Honduras, Romero was making $4 a day as a farm laborer for his family of five. He doesn't believe that illegal migrants can be deterred because their country is ["a s***hole] exactly how President Trump described it so ineloquently.

"They will keep coming," Romero said. "The people are afraid."

If, as the liberals say, the United States is such a miserable country, filled with horrible, racists who love their guns and have wreaked destruction all over the globe, why do people from all over the globe want to come here?

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Trump will use military to secure southern border until wall is built

President Trump said Tuesday that the U.S. will use a military unit at the southern border until a wall can be built, calling his plan a "big step."

POTUS made the remarks at a meeting with Baltic leaders. He said that he had discussed the matter with Defense Secretary James Mattis.

"Until we can have a wall and proper security, we're going to be guarding our border with the military," Trump said. "That's a big step, we really haven't done that before, or certainly not very much before."

He also spoke at a subsequent news conference and confirmed the plan. He said the border is unprotected by "our horrible, horrible [two horribles is quite horrible] and very unsafe laws."

[Can laws, per se, be 'unsafe' or are they simply ineffective?]

"We don't have laws, we have catch-and-release," he said, making reference to a fishing term. "You catch and then you immediately release and people come back years later for a court case, except they virtually never come back."

While the president didn't go into specifics, he apparently was strategically responding by a caravan with about 1,300 illegal aliens coming from Central America via Mexico.

The report of the caravan was first reported by Buzzfeed who said that Mexican officials did nothing to stop the flow.

When Trump first heard of the caravan's approach to our border, it angered him. He went on a tweet binge threatening to end the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and cut foreign aid to countries such as Hondura, where a majority of the illegal aliens originate.

"The big Caravan of People from Honduras, now coming across Mexica and heading to our "Weak Laws" Border, had better be stopped before it gets here," he threeted Tuesday. [A "threet" is a threatening tweet.] "Cash cow NAFTA is in play, as is foreign aid to Honduras and the countries that allow this to happen. Congress MUST ACT NOW!" 

Trump said that NAFTA was an "embarrassing" deal and told reporters that he spoke with Mexican officials on Monday: "I hope you're going to tell that caravan not to get up to the border." He added that he believes the caravan was being broken up as a result. In other words, that the large mass of people broke up into smaller groups.

The Pentagon was falling all over itself trying to come up with a response to Trump's statement about the military guarding the border. But Fox News reported that they received a memo and discussed the military option with officials, and said that one area where the Pentagon could contribute right away is the Air Force's Barry Goldwater live-fire range. It shares a 35-mile border with Mexico in southern Arizona.

Currently, the Defense Department is helping provide some border security with U.S. Navy vessels patrolling the waters to seize drugs, and missions involving over 100 personnel from the U.S. northern command--this includes 8 aircraft and a drone.



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