Following last-minute approval of the new NAFTA “free-trade” deal — the USMCA — that now includes Canada, the number two Senate Republican John Cornyn from Texas expressed doubts it could pass Senate muster. Cornyn told reporters: “I know people are still going through the details but it’s not a foregone conclusion that it will get confirmation by the Senate.” He said the earliest the Senate could vote on the USMCA would most certainly be after the November 6 midterm elections.
There are political considerations, however, in trying to pass the trade deal after the midterms but before the Congress is sworn in in January 2019, during the Senate’s “lame duck” session. Oregon Democrat Ron Wyden said that, given the current political climate in Washington following the harrowing Senate confirmation hearings over the confirmation of Judge Brett Kavanaugh, “The last thing that is needed right now, at a time of great pubic frustration with what’s going on with Washington, is ramming this through.”
As more and more of the details of the trade deal are exposed to the light of day, the more resistance to the sovereignty-damaging package builds. Thanks to journalists at The New American, details that have come to light include replacing the odious Chapter 19 of NAFTA with “a new governing international bureaucracy,” wrote Christian Gomez, called “a Free Trade Commission as a regional governing bureaucracy.” In fact, added Gomez, much of the language in the new updated “deal” steals language from the sovereignty-threatening Trans-Pacific Partnership — the TPP — that President Trump railed against while running for office. And according to Gomez, “Much like the TPP Commission, the Free Trade Commission can make changes to the USMCA without the consent of Congress. In fact, the agreement completely undermines Congress’ Constitutional Article I, Section 8 power to regulate trade with foreign nations.”
Gomez explained just how dangerous the “new,” “revised,” “updated,” and “wonderful” the new deal really is:
Under this scheme, the United States will be required to surrender its sovereignty in order for a chance to be a member of the winning team.
Americans have been lied to and duped by their government into believing that their elected leaders are working in their interest, only to subordinate America’s interests to those of North America.
It’s only a matter of time before the same charade is pulled on North America in order to integrate it with the world’s other regional trade blocs (i.e., the European Union, African Union, Union of South America, Eurasian Economic Union, RCEP, TPP, T-TIP) into one world economic union and commission, under the auspices of the United Nations and the World Trade Organization.
This writer believes he rightly dubbed the new USMCA “treachery”:
There’s the treachery: giving up essential constitutional guarantees with long-term negative implications for national sovereignty in order to cut a deal with socialists in Canada, Mexico, and supporters inside the Trump administration who cherish a global community in place of sovereign nations making their own enforceable decisions according to the will of their people.
Faux conservatives, however, want to hurry things along and not wait for the next Congress in 2019 to consider the matter. Included in that group is Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) who said the Senate “ought to move on Nafta [the new version] as soon as we can.”
But Senate rules, if they aren’t abrogated in the name of expediency, require that an economic impact analysis be presented to that body before it can vote, and that process usually takes 90 days. This is upsetting to the president who wants the deal done quickly: “In theory, there should be no trouble [getting confirmation from the Senate], but anything you submit to Congress is trouble,” he said, complaining of Democrats’ penchant to “delay, obstruct, resist.”
Those Democrats seeking to “delay, obstruct [and] resist” are giving Americanist activists working with The John Birch Society’s “Get US out! of NAFTA” program additional time not only to expose to the light of day the odious threat to national sovereignty contained in USMCA but to bring pressure to bear on their elected representatives to vote it down altogether.
Photo of John Cornyn: senate.gov
An Ivy League graduate and former investment advisor, Bob is a regular contributor to The New American magazine and blogs frequently at LightFromTheRight.com, primarily on economics and politics. He can be reached at [email protected].
Related articles:
NAFTA Finessed to Include Canada at the expense of U.S. Sovereignty
New NAFTA: Text of U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) Revealed
