22 April 2008

Bush gets backing from Canada, Mexico on trade push

This article is excerpted from the 22 April 2008 edition of “The New York Times”.

President Bush, stymied by Congress in his final push to broaden U.S. trade, is finding a bigger blast of support from north and south of the border.

The first day of a North American summit here showed off chummy relations, and markedly similar interests, among Bush and his counterparts from Mexico and Canada.

Bush was expected to expand on the those themes Tuesday by defending the economic benefits of trade and touting efforts to make traveling across borders less of a hassle.

To no surprise, the president's meetings with Mexican President Felipe Calderon and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper were not poised to produce any bold agreements….

The more dominant political theme of Bush's last North American summit is trade. Bush showed up here well aware of a rising anti-trade sentiment, whether on Capitol Hill, on the campaign trail of the Democrats who want his job, or among a disaffected workforce.

'All of us want to make sure we're treated fairly, and we can do that,' Bush said after meeting with Harper and Calderon individually. 'This summit comes at an opportune time to reaffirm the benefits of the trading arrangements between our three nations.'

Bush wants Congress to ratify free trade deals with Colombia, Panama and South Korea.

For his part, Calderon offered a strong defense of the North American Free Trade Agreement,… Bush credited the agreement with creating hundreds of thousands of jobs, improving choices for consumers and slowing the flow of job-seeking migrants from Mexico to the United States.

It so happens that the summit closes on the same day as the pivotal Democratic primary in Pennsylvania, an event sure to grab more attention. Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton, rivals for the Democratic presidential nomination, both have threatened to pull the U.S. out of NAFTA as a means to get Canada and Mexico to renegotiate the terms.

In brief remarks to reporters, the Canadian president [sic] praised his relationship with Bush, which he called frank and productive. 'The president has never promised me anything he couldn't deliver, and that