Canada

Jamieson Greer tells CBC News that tariffs will feature even in renegotiated CUSMA

U.S. President Donald Trump's point man on trade talks says Canada needs to accept that tariffs will be a part of any deal with the administration, including renewal of the Canada-U.S.-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA).

In interviews with two CBC News journalists on Capitol Hill just after Trump's state of the union address Tuesday night, U.S. trade representative Jamieson Greer suggested Canada can't expect to land a trade agreement that is free of tariffs.

"When we go to other countries, and we make a deal with them ... they agree that we can have a tariff on them," Greer told CBC News correspondent Katie Simpson.

"If Canada wants to agree that we can have some level of higher tariff on them while they open up their markets to us on things like dairy and other things, then that's a helpful conversation."

It's the clearest signal yet from the Trump administration that it's aiming for a fundamental rewrite of the free-trade deals that have existed between the U.S., Canada and Mexico since NAFTA took effect in 1994.