Byron Dorgan: “I generally come to the floor to talk about NAFTA, which is our trade relationship with our neighbor to the north…”

“I generally come to the floor to talk about NAFTA, which is our trade relationship with our neighbor to the north, Canada, and our neighbor to the south, Mexico. I say on a broader scale that our NAFTA trade agreement in my judgment has been a failure. We now have a $40 billion combined deficit with our two neighbors, Canada and Mexico. Prior to the enactment of NAFTA, the trade agreement with our two neighbors, we had a much more positive balance of trade. But since the enactment of NAFTA, we now see a nearly $40 billion combined trade deficit, which I think is a very serious problem. It is a growing problem, and one that we must deal with. But let me just deal with one part of the trade problem with Canada today. There is an avalanche of Canadian grain that is moving across our border, flooding into our marketplace, and that is depressing grain prices here in this country and taking money out of the pockets of American farmers.”