Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland is in Mexico City today for a signing ceremony for the modified North American free trade agreement, clearing the way for the contentious pact's long-awaited ratification.
After months of delays, U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi endorsed the renegotiated deal on Tuesday, saying progress has been made on the Democrats' main areas of concerns: workers' rights, the environment and prescription drug prices. At a media conference Tuesday morning, the California Democrat called tweaks to the bill "infinitely better" than the original text...
Freeland is on the ground to meet with her counterparts to finalize the updated agreement, known in Canada as the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement, or CUSMA...
Richard Neal, chair of the U.S. House Ways and Means committee, didn't say when the new deal will be tabled in the U.S., but Pelosi added they're hoping to get things in motion before the end of the congressional session on Dec. 20.
Canada also has yet to ratify the successor to the North American Free Trade Agreement. The Trudeau government introduced an implementation bill in the previous Parliament, but it did not pass before this fall's election...
This was excerpted from 10 December 2019 edition of the CBC News.