Signs of life appear in talks on renewing CUSMA despite Trump administration's hard line on tariffs
Mike Crawley · CBC News · Posted: May 28, 2026 1:00 AM PDT | Last Updated: 5 hours ago
Listen to this article
Estimated 7 minutes
The Canada-U.S.-Mexico Agreement is up for a joint review on July 1 that will determine whether the deal is renewed or renegotiated. While the U.S. and Mexico are currently in talks and have two more rounds of meetings scheduled in the coming weeks, Canada and the U.S. have yet to begin formal negotiations. (Darryl Dyck/The Canadian Press)Social Sharing
Sluggish trade negotiations between Canada and the U.S. are finally showing faint signs of life as a milestone looms for renewal of their three-way trade deal with Mexico.
The minister responsible for Canada-U.S. trade, Dominic LeBlanc, is planning to travel to Washington, D.C., for trade talks, although his spokespeople haven't confirmed a date.
Although the Canada-U.S.-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA) is due for its first-ever joint review on July 1, LeBlanc has held just one day of in-person talks over the past seven months with his Trump administration counterpart, U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer.
The slow pace of negotiations, along with the way U.S. President Donald Trump's tariff regime has punched holes in the free-trade deal, have combined to raise doubts about the fate of an agreement that is crucial to the Canadian economy.
CUSMA talks may run past July 1 deadline, U.S. trade envoy saysJuly 1 date for CUSMA review a 'checkpoint ... not a cliff,' Canada's chief negotiator says
CUSMA covers roughly $1.3 trillion in annual Canada-U.S. trade in goods and services and currently shields a large swathe of Canadian exports from Trump's tariffs.
According to the text of the agreement, the three countries are to notify each other of changes they want made by next Monday, one month ahead of the formal review, which comes six years after the sweeping trade deal took effect.
WATCH | Top U.S. negotiator criticizes Canada's approach to trade talks:
Trump's trade rep calls out Canada for retaliating against tariffs
11 hours ago|
Duration0:54U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, the top trade official in the Trump administration, told an audience in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday that Canada is 'in a different spot' from other countries when it comes to negotiating trade deals. Greer said only two countries in the world chose to retaliate against the U.S. over tariffs: Canada and the People's Republic of China.
The U.S. and Mexico are holding two days of bilateral talks on CUSMA starting today and have scheduled two further rounds of negotiations in June and July.
Meanwhile, Greer is portraying Canada as far more recalcitrant in coming to the table — at least on terms acceptable to the Trump administration.
Greer criticizes Canada's retaliation on tariffs
"Canada's approach has been different," Greer told an audience at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington on Tuesday.
"We've spent the past year and a half going to countries telling them we have to have some level of tariffs.
"Two countries in the world retaliated against us: the People's Republic of China and Canada. So they're just in a different spot, and it's hard to see necessarily where that ends."
AnalysisU.S. businesses love CUSMA. Why is Donald Trump threatening to pull out?FRONT BURNERWhy aren’t Canada and the U.S. officially talking trade?
The Carney government has looked to the CUSMA renewal talks as an opportunity to negotiate relief from Trump's tariffs.
In contrast, Greer and other Trump administration officials have repeatedly insisted that tariffs will be a fact of life for Canada, regardless of the free-trade deal.
Prime Minister Mark Carney and his minister responsible for Canada-U.S. trade, Dominic LeBlanc, leave a Liberal caucus meeting on Parliament Hill on Wednesday. (Spencer Colby/The Canadian Press)The U.S. has also indicated it wants concessions from Canada — described by multiple sources as an "entry fee" — before it will begin substantive negotiations on CUSMA, Radio-Canada reported in April.
Those concessions include ending provincial boycotts of U.S. alcohol sales and scrapping the federal Online Streaming Act, which requires large providers like Netflix and Disney+ to contribute a share of their revenue to support the production of Canadian content.
"We have been clear and consistent with the United States that we are ready to launch the joint review the moment they are," LeBlanc's press secretary, Gabriel Brunet, said Wednesday in an email to CBC News.
Ottawa seeking 'real relief' from tariffs
Canada has put forward proposals with "the potential to generate hundreds of billions of dollars in economic value for American industries and workers in exchange for real relief from the unfair tariffs imposed on Canadian products," Brunet said.
So far, the only tariff relief the Trump administration is offering to Canada would apply only to steel and aluminum companies that commit to move production to the U.S.
Washington demanding 'entry fee' from Ottawa before trade talks: sourcesAnalysisHere are Canada's biggest points of leverage in tariff and trade talks with the U.S.
Eric Miller, a Canada-U.S. trade expert based in Washington, says the two countries have "some pretty fundamental areas of disagreement" before they can get down to the nitty-gritty of negotiating specific trade-offs.
"I think it's important that Canada move as quickly as possible to try to get a deal, but not in such a way that it is willing to take any deal," Miller told CBC News.
WATCH | Trump's envoy in Ottawa says Canada shouldn't expect freedom from tariffs:
Canada should expect tariffs to continue, U.S. ambassador says
May 24|
Duration2:41U.S. Ambassador Pete Hoekstra said the president has imposed tariffs on the whole world and Canada shouldn't expect to be an exception. The comments come as renewed discussion of Canada's Online Streaming Act adds to ongoing cross-border tension.
"Anybody can negotiate a bad deal quickly. But what Canada needs is a good deal," said Miller, president of Rideau Potomac Strategy Group, a consulting firm.
Miller does not believe it's particularly significant that Mexico is currently further ahead in its CUSMA renewal talks than Canada. However, he says the significance ramps up if Mexico reaches its own separate deal with the U.S., without Canada soon doing the same.
Mexico and Canada have been communicating directly about trade, although their annual two-way commerce in goods is around $56 billion, a mere fraction of each country's trade with the U.S.
Which Trump tariffs affect Canada now?Trump's man in Ottawa doesn't understand why Canadians are so frustrated right now
Any country can withdraw from CUSMA by giving six months' notice. Such a withdrawal by the U.S. would end the tariff exemption currently granted to most Canadian exports.
"President Trump is notoriously fickle and he could wake up and decide, 'You know what? I don't want to do this [tariff exemption] anymore', " Miller said.
Trump was in his first term as president when the U.S., Canada and Mexico negotiated CUSMA as a successor to the North American Free Trade Agreement. At the time, Trump hailed it as "the largest, most significant, modern, and balanced trade agreement in history."
Christopher Sands, director of the Center for Canadian Studies at Johns Hopkins University, says that when Trump has threatened to withdraw from CUSMA, something he first floated last fall, it's a bargaining tactic to try to win more concessions.
"Canada can play it cool, I think, as long as no one is actually withdrawing," Sands said in an interview.
"I think the U.S. is just going to keep trying to heap pressure on everyone to get as many concessions as possible before it says, 'Yes, we'll renew'," he said.
Canada must 'hold its ground': former negotiator
Steve Verheul, who was Canada's chief negotiator in the talks that led to the creation of CUSMA, says the review will have a profound impact on the country's economic future. He's urging the federal government to resist U.S. pressure for concessions.
"The U.S. is blaming Canada for the lack of movement, but the U.S. is putting Canada in a position where it has little room to move," Verheul said Wednesday on Parliament Hill, where he testified before the Senate committee on foreign affairs and international trade.
Verheul said there is broad support among Republicans in Congress, U.S. businesses and the American public for renewing the agreement.
"Over time, I believe pressures on the U.S. to come to a resolution will increase," Verheul told the Senate committee. "As uncomfortable as it may be, Canada needs to hold its ground."
Carney says U.S. trade talks will 'take some time,' vows Trump won't dictate the termsCarney names advisory committee on Canada-U.S. economic relations as CUSMA review nears
It's not precisely clear how the Canada-U.S. trade talks will proceed.
LeBlanc's press secretary declined to give any details of the minister's upcoming trip to Washington, including dates, who he'll be meeting with or the scope of any scheduled talks.
A spokesperson for the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative did not respond to a CBC News query on Wednesday about Greer's plans for negotiating with Canada.
CorrectionsA previous version of this story said that Dominic LeBlanc will travel to Washington next week. In fact, LeBlanc's spokesperson did not specify when the minister's trip will take place.
May 28, 2026 5:14 AM PDT
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Mike Crawley
Correspondent
Mike Crawley is a correspondent for CBC News, based in Washington. He began his career as a newspaper reporter in B.C., spent six years as a freelance journalist in various parts of Africa, then joined the CBC in 2005. Mike reported on Ontario politics for 15 years. He was born and raised in Saint John, N.B.