U.S. President Donald Trump has told the director of the National Economic Council (NEC) and the United States Trade Representative (USTR) to negotiate the country’s re-entry into the Trans-Pacific Partnership, according to a senator who met with the president on Thursday.
Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), said in a press release issued April 12 that, during a meeting at the White House, the president directed NEC Director Larry Kudlow and USTR Robert Lighthizer to look at re-entering TPP negotiations.
“The best thing the United States can do to push back against Chinese cheating now is to lead the other 11 Pacific nations that believe in free trade and the rule of law,” Sasse said in the statement. “It is good news that today the president directed Larry Kudlow and Ambassador Lighthizer to negotiate U.S. entry into TPP.”
Trump withdrew from the TPP on January 23, 2017 – three days after his inauguration – living up to a campaign promise and drawing ire from the agriculture industry.
The Obama administration signed onto the TPP, but Congress never ratified the action. The 11 countries that signed the TPP are Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam.
On Thursday, Trump tweeted: “Would only join TPP if the deal were substantially better than the deal offered to Pres. Obama. We already have BILATERAL deals with six of the eleven nations in TPP, and are working to make a deal with the biggest of those nations, Japan, who has hit us hard on trade for years!”
Japan, Australia and New Zealand said they welcomed Trump’s interest in returning to the deal, but officials suggested they would resist renegotiation of the deal.