December 14, 2017 | HAGSTROM REPORT –
Senate Agriculture Committee Chairman Pat Roberts, R-Kan., today urged President Donald Trump not to terminate the North American Free Trade Agreement, and criticized Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., for putting a hold on Trump’s nomination of Greg Doud to be chief agriculture negotiator in the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative.
“Don’t start the clock on termination. That sends a lot of signals we don’t need to be sending,” Roberts said at a Washington International Trade Association event with former Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont.
Roberts said American farmers need to sell their products now, and withdrawing from NAFTA would add to farmers’ demands that farm bill benefits be increased at a time when Congress does not have the money for that.
Roberts also said Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Trans Pacific Partnership negotiations was “most unfortunate.”
Noting that he had met with the president four times, Roberts said he had pointed out that farmers voted for Trump “due to the regulatory overkill they were feeling.”
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