Rep. Hill Discusses China Trade Talks, USMCA with C-SPAN's Washington Journal

Interview

Today, Congressman French Hill (AR-02) joined Pedro Echevarria on C-SPAN's Washington Journal to discuss the ongoing trade negotiations between the United States and China, as well as the benefits of the new United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) for American farmers.

Key excerpts below:

"America is better positioned because we are the larger economy and we have a better trade position than China. China's economy has been slowing. They have debt problems and employment challenges in China. I think we are slightly better positioned at this moment."
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"I don't support using tariffs as extensively as the president does. For example, I oppose the section 232 steel and aluminum tariffs across the board for security purposes because it raises prices for Americans and disrupts intermediate goods manufacturers, including in [Arkansas's] Second Congressional District.
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"I think that strategically Congress, on a bipartisan basis, says that President Trump is right to be aggressively approaching China about changing their mercantilist system and their protectionist practices. He has chosen tariffs as a 'bring them to the table' effort and it's working. We are at that table. "
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"I do think if you're going to have a bilateral or trilateral trade agreement, you have to have enforcement mechanisms and you have to have dispute resolution [mechanisms]. This USMCA has both and the agreement of digital trade and modernizing the agreement for the information technology world and intellectual property world that we have is a big step up from the old 1994 agreement. That's why, on balance, I believe the USMCA is an improvement over NAFTA. It's good for the United States. President Trump accomplished the goals he laid out in modernizing NAFTA and I believe Congress should move it expeditiously for approval."

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