Push for Nafta Overhaul May Fall Short, U.S. Negotiator Says<br />In remarks ahead of a third round of talks beginning on Saturday in Ottawa, Robert Lighthizer, the United States trade representative, said negotiators were “moving at warp speed,<br />but we don’t know whether we’re going to get to a conclusion, that’s the problem.”<br />“We’re running very quickly — somewhere,” Mr. Lighthizer said in a rare question-and-answer session at the Center for Strategic<br />and International Studies, a Washington-based think tank.<br />WASHINGTON — The top United States trade negotiator said Monday<br />that it was unclear whether Canada, Mexico and the United States could reach a deal to overhaul the North American Free Trade Agreement within the ambitious timetable set by the Trump administration.<br />“The political calendar is such that if we don’t get a deal more or less by the end of the year... it will get harder<br />and harder,” Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, who helps lead the trade agenda, said last week.<br />The Trump administration has carved out a narrow path to victory on Nafta, pledging to hammer out substantial<br />changes in a matter of months to a sweeping pact governing most of the North American economy.<br />The White House is particularly eager to show progress on the trade agenda — one of President Trump’s signature campaign issues — given the failure of Congress to repeal<br />and replace the Affordable Care Act and the uncertainty about tax reform.<br />They fear approval could be complicated by a series of events, including Mexico’s presidential election<br />on July 1, 2018, midterm elections in the United States and provincial elections in Canada.
