New Democrats Director Says Group Undecided on USMCA

The New Democrat Coalition, a caucus of generally pro-free-trade Democrats in the House of Representatives, has not coalesced around the NAFTA replacement, according to J.D. Grom, executive director of the group, speaking Jan. 29 on a panel at the Washington International Trade Association annual conference. "Members are still working through where we're at on the agreement," he said, but they are clear that they will be unhappy if President Donald Trump tries to withdraw the U.S. from NAFTA to force a yes vote on its replacement. "We don't want to be in a hostage situation," he said.

Grom was careful in his language around U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer, who has met with Democrats on the House Ways and Means Committee and with the New Democrats even before Democrats took the majority in the chamber. Lighthizer "took a different strategy that didn't center around the New Democrat coalition," according to Grom, who suggested that voting against fast track or a particular trade deal can be a messaging vote. A trade vote "is the one time a member of Congress has a chance to say, 'I hear your pain and I'm going to do something to stop it,'" he said, even if the pain is because a factory moved to the South, or jobs were eliminated because of automation.