USMCA and China trade deals combined push planet towards climate crisis

WASHINGTON – The U.S. Senate today voted to approve the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement, aka Trump’s NAFTA. The USMCA will facilitate increased production and trade in tars sands oil and fracked gas across the three countries, give corporate polluters a leg-up in challenging environmental regulations and allow oil and gas giants like Chevron and ExxonMobil to challenge climate and environmental protections in private tribunals. 

Senate approval of USMCA comes just as the Trump Administration signed a trade agreement with China in which China agrees to buy $52.4 billion of additional U.S. energy products, which will result in billions of dollars in exports of climate-damaging and community-poisoning liquefied natural gas, crude oil and coal.

In response to the vote, Erich Pica, president of Friends of the Earth, issued the following statement: 

It’s incredibly disappointing to see Congress approve the USCMA with no provisions whatsoever to address climate change.  By shirking this responsibility, Congress set a precedent for future trade agreements that not only fails to address the greatest threat facing our planet but makes it worse.  Trump’s new trade agreement with China, which will increase exports of climate-damaging and community-poisoning liquefied natural gas, crude oil and coal is a prime example.

Expert contact: Doug Norlen, (510) 900-3143, [email protected]
Communications contact: Erin Jensen, (202) 222-0722, [email protected]