WASHINGTON—U.S. President Donald Trump talks about terminating NAFTA as if that would be as easy for him to do as firing off a tweet or ordering a second scoop of ice cream. Some experts agree with him. But a bunch don’t. These experts say it is only Congress, not the president, that has the authority to kill the North American trade pact. If Trump tried, in other words, they believe he could be blocked by pro-NAFTA legislators. The vigorous debate is taking place in corporate boardrooms, legal offices and think tanks across the continent. Once a matter of mere academic interest, it may now have huge stakes for Canada. And everybody involved agrees on just one thing: it will probably be decided by judges. “I think the only certainty is that if Trump were to go ahead and withdraw, or purport to withdraw, there would be lawsuits immediately. And probably injunctions. And this thing will be tied up in courts for a while,” said Matthew Kronby, a Toronto trade lawyer with Bennett Jones and former director general of Canada’s Trade Law Bureau. “I have spoken as recently as yesterday with a lawyer at a prominent U.S. law firm where one lawyer has looked at it and had a particular view — he thought the president did have the authority to do so unilaterally — but he acknowledged that there were several other people in his firm that came to the opposite conclusion,” Kronby said.The question is especially important because of the vast gulf between the views of Trump and many of his Republican colleagues on the subject. As Trump has derided NAFTA as the worst trade deal in world history, several senior Republicans have been outspokenly supportive of the agreement. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his ministers have courted American legislators, but they say they aren’t counting on Congress to save the day. The government’s read of the situation, an official said on condition of anonymity, is that Trump could ...
|
