While House Democrats were putting on a show with their attempts to impeach the president, he delivered on a top campaign promise. On the 2016 campaign trail, candidate Trump promised to get better trade deals, and last week President Trump got it done.
A majority (55%) of the American people back the proposed US-Canada-Mexico trade agreement (USMCA), according to a Dec. 15, 2019 CNN poll, but American views of foreign trade have improved as well with sentiment on foreign trade now the most positive in over 25 years, according to CNN tracking. In 1992, when asked if they thought foreign trade was more of “an opportunity for economic growth through increased U.S. exports,” or “more as a threat to the economy from foreign imports,” 44% said they saw it as an opportunity and 48% said they saw it as a threat. Nearly two decades later in Nov. 2010, only 41% of Americans said they saw it as an opportunity and 50% said they saw it as a threat. But as of this Dec. 19, 71% of Americans saw foreign trade as an opportunity and only 16% saw it as a threat.
USMCA’s passage – along with the Trump tax cuts and record employment – gives the president a strong base reelection talking point. Democrats may drag impeachment into 2020 and continue pushing unrealistic socialist policies that increase taxes on Middle America and take away their choices, but a booming economy will likely have a bigger effect on next November’s votes, especially if the president articulates his economic priorities for a second term.
