Their support for the nafta agreement, that were to revamp nafta. Live coverage on cspan2. The president of the American Farm bureau federation, ron bonnett, president of the Canadian Federation of agriculture, and the president of the agro in mexico. These men will get there dues that should happen with modernization of nafta. No matter what you may have heard there is a great deal our nations have in common and can agree upon. They will get your opening remarks, after that we will have a signing of a letter and minister freeland and chief negotiators for the treaty. After that we will open the floor to questions. If you have a question at the press club please wait for a microphone so that people on the phone can hear the question you are asking. The floor is yours. Thank all of you for attending today. This is an important day to american agriculture, canadian agriculture and mexican every culture and we show our unity together and i want to thank mister bonnett for being with us today and joining us in talking about modernization of nafta trade treaty. Everyone in the room know that American Farmers and ranchers value trade relationships with the closest neighbors, canada and mexico, they are number one and number 3 customers in the United States, exports, and they are the top two suppliers of agricultural imports, our trade relations are important on the stage here. We have a vital interest in helping neighbors make improvements, to do no harm to the games we have gained in nafta. We are committed to preserving and expanding upon the gains agriculture has achieved and ensure a modernized nafta continues to be a success story, north America Farmers and ranchers was we want timely enforcement of trade agreements and prompt resolutions to disputes that might arise in the new modernization treaty. And 137 billion this year, forecast of agriculture imports of 104. 5 billion, giving us a trade surplus and a surplus, 22. 5 billion. The criticism of trade deals, we in agriculture want our negotiators to know the trade deals in open markets are largely beneficial to American Farmers and ranchers and communities we live in and do our business in, raise our families. There will be opportunities during these negotiations to talk about issues concerning us with commodities. It is important to enter these talks with cool heads and focus on the common goals, agree that trade helps all our citizens and farmers and ranchers in our countries and look forward to a better agreement, that modernized modern agriculture. Ron bonnett of the canadian agriculture. Thank you to the hospitality, we had the opportunity it gave us an opportunity to exchange views where things are going, between mister devol and i think we realize there was a lot of Common Ground we can build on. Ministers and secretaries make opening remarks on renegotiation of nafta and it is interesting in the opening comments we heard the word agriculture a number of times, leadership in all three countries recognizing agriculture is important, we are farm leaders of all three count countries must exist farmers and ranchers must be heard as negotiations proceed. I think press for coming out on an issue of great importance to economies of all three countries. American farm bureau and mexico, it is appropriate to try to find Common Ground we had when we moved forward and we are we have prepared a joint statement and subsequent letter to our negotiators based on the principle of do no harm. For agriculture, nafta, if we look at the changes since 1994, trade between our countries has grown exponentially. We must build on this success. With canada, us, we have 56 billion in reciprocal trade and the us has a surplus at this time, mexico and canada, additional trade, mexico has a slight surplus. Canada is the top export market for 29 us states but as farm leaders we have outlined Common Ground from the path forward. There are five areas we agreed on. One is focused on increased and improved regulatory alignment. The secondary is looking at improving the flow of goods at border crossings. The third is further alignment of sciencebased measures and with that bouncy term that is human, animal and plant health issues. The elimination of nonsciencebased technical barriers to trade is another barrier we concentrate on and adapting agreement to Technology Advances that have been made 1994. The internet digitally, those were not even thought of. In closing i would like to heckle what was said this morning. We have a relationship based on trust and understanding. Agriculture has been a success. And remember, do no harm. Thank you. Finally, the president of senator. American farm bureau. Translator members of the press and members of cna. We have the privilege of our secretaries of agriculture, sunny purdue from the United States, Lawrence Mclaren from canada, they have been sending signals together to Work Together as a team. First of all, at the georgia meeting where they were present. And in mexico, where mister perdue they were together. Today our secretary took a great example of construction and understandable. And the primary production. In cordiality and respect. And they are expressing the agriculture sector. I want to remember you the National Council of agriculture represents 80 of mexico. And 75 of exports. As well as growers, recognizing United States and canada as great partners complementary. I belong to the thirdgeneration of growers, an american or canadian commercial partner. We understand the primary production is vital for the economy. A commercial block, more successful. We will be more competitive. Making more strongly in north america. We can go out to new markets in asia, south america and europe. The National Council of agriculture is in favor of commercial violence, more and the National Council would be looking always to maintain competitive in the markets. [speaking in native tongue] translator we are committed to looking for better marketing access into the countries. The fight should be treated by profit. In addition, in order the risk of each one. For modernization of nafta should be should be made as strong as the trade in the union. And contributes to the development of the partners. Mister bennett. [speaking in native tongue] translator i celebrate the private sectors of free countries. We are together taking care of main concerns of the sector. We are very clear from the point of view of mexico, we have been talking with the government. We are not exchanging for any other economic activity. Thank you for being here especially with your tight schedules. And you can count on mexico to be to gather. Thank you very much. Thank you, we will have a ceremonial signing to minister freelands, robert light heiser of the United States, gentlemen. [applause] thank you, gentlemen. Thanks to the effort of the staff. Very good. Okay. Thank you, sir. We can open the floor to questions, please wait for the mic so people can hear you. Where is the microphone . There you are. Just to start off, i would like to get your reaction to the Opening Statement today in which he said although nafta benefited us formers and border communities it fundamentally fails Many Americans and would need major improvements and tweaking and updating a few chapters would not be acceptable. What concerns does that raise in terms of possible trade offs . Of course it concerns us that we would have that mentioned upfront, but our stand is we do no harm. This has been a good trade treaty for north american agriculture from mexico to canada. We want to make sure we have that as i always heard loud and clear we dont want to harm the gains we had in it. The president of the United States is my president too, played a major role in getting him elected and he promised not only to make treaties more fair for the American People but all the American People and i dont see them doing harm to this treaty that has been good for agriculture. There might be concerned but agriculture, in the fact that it was very much singled out that agriculture was a shining example of how the success could work and back to mister devols statement of do no harm, we have to ensure that that message is heard loud and clear, and in part, the three of us decided very quickly that we needed to make a statement to the negotiators that we have something that works, dont do something and negotiate something that will undermine that because that will undermine not only farmers and ranchers but all of the jobs related to farmers and ranchers in all three countries. [speaking in native tongue] translator i have the opportunity to be in the press conference. [speaking in native tongue] translator i was very glad to hear the senator mentioned several times, what we have with some products like corn and soy. [speaking in native tongue] translator recognizing the importance of the sector for the United States. And i think that is a very good signal from the beginning. For the coming of our countries. In the back. Identify your organization if you could. Bloomberg radio. Mention was made of improving regulation on the basis of science and other regulations, barriers to trade. Would you elaborate on what you mean by that . And i get the impression the american side that you would be better off if trump had never raised this issue in the first place. Tell me about that and i will pass the microphone to my colleague. From bloomberg news, quick question. I was recently in florida talking to growers about their concerns and they have a different perspective than american agriculture on nafta. I direct this question to mister devol about the concerns florida growers have with mexican shipments in the case of food inspections, labor rates, wages in mexico, food safety standards. For mister devol i wonder if theres anything you can do to address those concerns without setting bad precedent for us farmers in other areas. Im wondering what areas ucs under discussion that would create, there are eight questions. You talked about sciencebased and technical barriers, that could be a number of things, the scientific process is the same for approval so we dont have to go through a separate series of hoops on the approval, you talk about technical barriers, one of the things we discussed at lunch was the idea of inspection services. If there is an inspection approved in one country and accepted by the other three, one inspection should suffice. It should not be reinspected every time it moves across the border. All those things will streamline costs for producers and streamline costs for the consumers of those products. That goes back to the theory of building on what has been working and trying to streamline the processes on regulations and technical barriers so we get closer to harmonization. I hope that answers the question. [speaking in native tongue] translator we went a for trade with rules of commerce. The topic in transference and based on science. We are agreed that our country maintains this chapter in controversial solution. The labor topics in each country, should be addressing their own things. Mexico has an agreement and is working very hard in this process. The question you asked. When it comes to farmers in florida, northeastern Dairy Farmers, upper midwest, some areas have some concerns. What could i do to change that . Our organization, all these organizations have very Good Communications with our government, my communication mostly through secretarys office and we keep them informed as to where there are issues that we can approach to try to solve. It comes down to deciding we are really a region of these three countries and for us to bound together a very strong region is important to show the rest of the world, it will be important in future negotiations and trade treaties. We have to set our feelings aside and tell each other we have problems. We do have a problem in florida and the northeast, we have a problem in certain areas and lets have some rules around this treaty, swift decisions on how we solve these problems because time means money. We cant afford for them to be in limbo when there is a problem with the trade treaty. We have to bind together this region, discuss what our problems have to do with each other and have solutions. [speaking in native tongue] translator we could go into an analogy statebystate and an interesting thing will happen. In the Global Vision of the trade between mexico, the United States and canada, mexico has winners and losers. The corn in mexico. During a serious problem of competition. Mexico is standing solids. And we are receiving a very important volume of grains. I wanted to add something you mentioned about chapter 19 resolution. With any trade agreement it is almost mandatory that there be a mechanism in place to deal with disputes when they arise. Having a trade agreement that doesnt have some type of format for how you resolve this is creating a trade agreement that doesnt have any portion of it but from our perspective and the canadian governments perspective this resolution is critical as the agreement goes forward. Penny star with breitbart news. On one of your lists, you talk about improved flow of goods at border crossings. Can you address how that fits in with Border Security and your concerns about that . From a canadian perspective i live close to the us border. One of the issues we find is hold ups at the border with perishable products, delay of several hours and go from having a very valuable cargo to one that is worth nothing. Finding ways to get a preapproved clearance, Electronic Filing using all the new technologies available, so when that truck hits the border, the truck, the driver, everybody is preapproved, recognizing in the world we are living in, you have to have security clearance but i was at the airport coming from the United States the other day and people going to the next line go through a lot faster than people who dont. It is a similar approach to goods being transported across the border as we are doing at border entry for people. Speaking to the immigration issue, that is something im not an expert in, we would leave that up to the experts to handle that but we can speak the issue, it is important that when we deliver products to our neighbors, coming and good quality, that quality is determined by how quickly and swiftly it can get through the borders. Translator i believe we have the commitment of national security. And lights turn into fields or certification. On the process. And expedited supervision at the border. And when ripe to it. To contribute to the safety. The questions on the phone. Putting speaker on, name and organization please. Please proceed with your question. Thanks for taking my call. Other gentlemen concerned about trump administrations fixation on reducing manufacturing trade deficit and might hurt and interest that benefited nafta. We carry that concern, the first question we answered was close to that but we have a concern, what we did in this trade treaty to this point. We went from 8 billion of trade in america to 38 billion of trade in the last time of nafta, we wont do arm to that and if possible even make it better for all three countries agriculturalwise. We understand there are manufacturing problems and we leave that up to experts to have that conversation and continue to impress on them we do not want them to use us as a trading tool to do harm to our by and large agriculture and trade is much more balanced than manufacturing trade and dont want to see agriculture sacrificed. We have done a good job taking advantage of opportunities so why should we be penalized for that . [speaking in native tongue] translator in mexico there is an up session about the deficit. But we want to say mexico is representing only 8 . And we can say 70 , it is from a north american company. To the United States. And made in mexico forms 40 of components made in the region. And the outcome from other parties has an integration of 8 to 12 . In the Agricultural Sector we have a lot of canadian and United StatesCompany Investing in mexico, exporting mexico to their own countries and the changed value, in any case of the exporters. The destination country, canada or United States. Some important commercial partner or investment, investor or shareholder. Thank you. Can we hold on for a question from the floor, operator . Go ahead. Both the us and mexico said they to finish negotiations as soon as possible, ideally by next year because upcoming auctions in both countries. If you could comment on whether that is a realistic timeline and if you could comment on longer negotiations that are drawn out, the agricultural markets, thank you. Mexico has two plans. For first is to conclude the negotiation or modernization of the agreement as soon as possible. Affecting the sense of the free trade agreement. The idea will be we will be finished in january. It is not we will wait until the timing and essence of the treatment will come. The understanding that nafta will continue operating, we will wait. We say in the aviation, in a few cases in the very the case the United States decides to please nafta, mexico, with omc. One comment. I am caught in the middle here. However, one of these things, number one is going to be up to the negotiators to determine what the timeframe is going to be as to when these are finalized but our role this is to ensure the concerns of farmers and ranchers and countries i heard as we go through the negotiation but one comment i would make, negotiators go through this, any discussions take place in the public builds on confidence of a trading relationship and not undermine that confidence. Every day we have farmers shipping product, and undermines that. And moving ahead. It is not really good in america, certainty. And it is our desire, and it happened quickly. Getting our discussions behind us to bring some certainty to the markets for farmers for the next crop next year. And be prepared for that. It was not healthy for the farmers or the markets and this will play a major role in those areas. The highly encouraged them to get it done fast and we are looking for the successful modernization. Take another question from those on the phone line. Our next question, cromwell ag network, please proceed with your question. Thanks for taking our calls. My question would be this. Is the commonality discovered under the Transpacific Partnership before the us withdrew, should that be the baseline for the beginning of negotiations . Or is that the epitome we might expect . [speaking in native tongue] translator we have big advances in the tpp we can consider for modernization of nafta. And we know that 11 countries left propose to continue with the agreement. For mexico was very important to tpp because coordinating the perfect picture of nafta with canada and the United States. You mentioned tpp being a base. Not sure i would call it a base but one of the things, it outlines the scope of a modern trade agreement. The idea of using it is the Market Dynamics have changed with the United States not being part of tpp, very difficult to accept that as a base going forward. Talking about the scope, other than that i dont see it being news of the day. A lot of areas in tpp, excited about. Hopefully there will be pieces but thinking that treaty would be used as a base i dont think that will be what will happen. We hope they do pick up some modernization and bring it into this modernization. More questions from the floor. Yes, sir. The japanese newspaper, april up on tpp, the president withdraw from the tpp side, they are missing out. What is your stance on fta and what about the seriousness of trump and the administration . Obviously i havent spoken directly to him and hearing him talk about future trade treaties with other countries, very possible, we are hoping other countries are interested in having those conversations and i would hope japan would be open to that discussion of a bilateral treatment treaty. Anyone still on the phone that wants to ask a question . We have a question from the line of Ellen Ferguson from cq rollcall, please proceed with your question. I wanted to ask about supply management, that has been a big concern with us Dairy Farmers but they are concerned, that seems to be an area, it will depend, do you see, is there a potential they might accept s to supply management . Our government has been very clear stating they are going to defend supply management and we stand behind that and one things the three of us when we talk about putting together a joint statement, concentrate on those areas with common interests, we can identify areas where each country has issues they can bring forward. If we spend our time talking about these all it would be is a family site. I mentioned the three countries operate in close relationship. We will have differences and i dont think it is bad to have differences and a healthy discussion around those. Bloomberg radio. Time for one more question after this. Thank you. In terms of doing no harm, what do you know of the negotiating position the Us Government would do harm drying from the agreement and would you be better off if trump never raised the issue . American agriculture is not seeking renegotiation or modernization of this trade treaty but once the election started and the rhetoric started we have a new president , who has that desire, of course we look for opportunities. All three of our countries will be even better off than what we are today. We are going to go into this very optimistically and see if he accomplish what he wants to do in this trade treaty, our farmers will have certainty in the markets and certainty where they will be exporting to and what they are planning and producing next year. I think we have the opportunity to make something that is good and make it better. If you start swapping off gains and weak gains for some other business sector, it could be harmful to american agriculture. Or if we put pressure into another country that might make a decision to take their decision elsewhere, it could be harmful to our farmers. Lets not try to fix whats not broken in the agricultural piece of nafta is not totally broken but it could take some attention in certain areas. I think when the discussion of reopening nafta, i think ourselves and the canadian government recognize that this has been in place since 94. There has been a lot of stuff that has changed but i think thats why when our organizations got together and started identifying areas to make improvement, we were very specific about the types of things that would improve trade flows and harmonize regulation. Things should be updated. When you go that long a time period, it likely needs to be updated. Our advice has been focused on those recommendations. If those are achieved it will make things better for farmers in all three countries. [speaking in native tongue] [speaking in native tongue] from 1994 until this date the commerce between the countries will increase three times. That process has been the same process in mexico and canada. We are the most competitive are area, and without agreement we are going to make more stronger asia, especially china. For the final question, is anyone left on the phone . Anyone from the floor . With that, thank you all for coming. You have my contact information, let us know if we can do anything to help. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] a live look at trump tower in new york city. President trump was there this morning. He is scheduled to visit wall street, and later to head backtn bedminster new jersey. He plans to sign a bill that will end a 15 year limit for veterans to user education benefits and restore benefits to veterans who school abruptly closed. We will keep my on the lobby cspan has been on the road meeting with the winners of this years competition. In golden cololorado, the winner accepted the second place prize of 1500 for his documentary on cyber security. Also in denver, the third place was awarded 750 to 210th graders for their documentary about digital theft and hacking. [inaudible] [inaudible] he won a prize for his documentary on marijuana. At a nearby Elementary School students one on a honorable mention. Thank you to all the students who took part in the 2017 student cam competition. To watch the videos go to student cam. Org and student cam 2018 starts in september for the constitution and you. Students can choose any provision of the u. S. Constitution and create a video illustrating why its important. Coming up in about 20 minutes we will take you live to how the recent election in kenya impacted the country. First, we will show you a portion of todays washington journal. She is joining us to talk about events that took place in charlottesville and the white house reaction. You have a piece that highlights what the president reacted. What was the take away from his statements yesterday the statement from the president s statement yesterday is very differentof from my column that was put out addressing his comments from saturday. I thought they were appropriate and i thought from yesterday i thought they should have participated in his speech yesterday because he was accurate. What we have are two sides culminating in an American City over an issue that exploded into violence what we saw sunday and monday was provoking because many thought he didnt go far enough. What we saw on tuesday was a lashing. I think the media understands if they keep pushing this president that he will lash out and then it gives us all something to talk about as far as the specific statements from yesterday, do you agree with them as far as the issue being a both sides issue i would agree with that from even on saturday. Absolutely. We do have an old right and we do have an all left. What happened in our societyas over the past 50 years as much of our culture unraveled, weve scrubbed our school from any mention of religion, marriage has collapsed when it comes to a conjugal marriage. These tensions are coming into this environment. The all right and the all left [inaudible] many individuals from the group, theres 89 or 90 of these all left group that no one wants to talk about but we know there are three on the owl we know who they are and we know the history and we also know we need to push them back in the ground where they were after they lost the civil war and the civil rights movement. Too not acknowledge the other side thats instigating this is not going to get us to come to a healthy conclusion when you hear a lot of reaction including several republicans talking about the equivalency between these two groups, what was your reaction be . Its mixed. O on one hand, there is a moral equivalency. In fact, i did a show on n another network on this same topic and i told them how the Confederate Flag in the rainbow flag represent the same thing. When you think about it, someone is not welcome here. On the Confederate Flag its black spread on the rainbow flag its christian. As a result, i heard from the alt for me to pretend there is not a strong all left, my office had to close yesterday, locket stores as a result of their hate. For me to sit here and pretend that that hate is not as deeply rooted on the left as a it is on the right, i would be disingenuous about the reality that i know. With that said, i understand what the legislators were trying to do, in particular, my friend, speaker paul ryan. T what they are trying to do is keep this call. The president gets provoked easily. We are in the environment of more relativism and it justice becomes my rule and my rule is not a good idea. We been there a couple places i in history and is not to look really pretty in our lifetime as well if you want to ask your questions, 202 7488001 for republicans. , 20270 2,027,488,002 for democrats we have so many things that need to get done. Im working forward to working with this administration to help inner cities. We want marketbased solutions to fight poverty. The American People spoke in the voting booth. This is where we battle. Interestingly, this is where they babbled in that town of charlottesville. The city council voted, lets remove this. I dont think the all right should have been there at all even though they had constitutional right to go