Senator Paul J. Massicotte

MPs travelled to Mobile, Alabama, last week to highlight the strength of Canadian industry to U.S. politicians and business leaders in the midst of a looming trade war between the United States and Canada.

Conservative MP Randy Hoback (Prince Albert, Sask.), NDP MP Brian Masse (Windsor West, Ont.), and Liberal MP T.J. Harvey (Tobique-Mactaquac, Ont.) travelled to Mobile and represented the Canadian section of the Canada-U.S. Inter-Parliamentary Group (IPG) at the Conference of the Southeastern United States–Canadian Provinces Alliance.

The Canadian section of the IPG has 16 co-chairs and vice-chairs, and more than 120 members.

In the past two years, the level of U.S. politicians’ knowledge of NAFTA and Canadian trade has grown “considerably higher” due to the non-partisan work of the Canadian side of the IPG, Mr. Hoback, a vice-chair of the IPG, told The Hill Times.

“Now it’s like preaching to the choir, whereas two years ago it was a very strong educational process,” he said.

Mr. Masse, also a vice-chair of the IPG, who spoke with Phil Bryant, the Mississippi governor, at the conference, said there is “quite an understanding and a deep level of respect of the trade amongst our partners at the state level and the governor level.”

“Unfortunately though, they don’t make the final decision. It’s the Trump administration and the president in particular,” he said.

Two weeks ago, the U.S. government announced tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum, and the Canadian government responded with its own list of retaliatory tariffs, set to take effect on July 1.

“We’re here just doing our regular work in the mean time as things kind of unfold. … The issues are just settling in, with regards to sorting out tariffs, but we’re here to hear about the industry and we’re hearing a lot of the same things about the integrated supply chain, so it’s going to be interesting how it shakes down in places like this. Nobody even knows yet,” Mr. Masse said.

In spite of the tense relations between the two countries, the IPG will continue to work together and strengthen the relationship between Canadian and U.S. legislators, Mr. Masse told The Hill Times.

“Unfortunately at the end of the day there’s one person with one Twitter account that seems to have the prominence of all the say. And we’ll never control that and that’s okay, because the work we do has got to be across several different layers, and we’ll continue to do that,” he said.

Republican Bill Huizenga, House Representative for Michigan’s 2^nd district and co-chair of the U.S. section of the Canada-U.S IPG, said engagement in IPG will happen whether or not the two countries along the 49^th parallel have strong relations.

“This is not a new situation that friends and allies are having disagreements, and sometimes robust discussions and robust disagreements, but as I said both here in the U.S. media as well as in Canadian media, we are economic and security allies and friends and we can’t forget that,” Mr. Huizenga told The Hill Times.

“We want to make sure that when we have inter-family squabbles that we’ve got some folks that are able to sit down and look each other squarely in the eye and try to figure some of these issues out.”

He said building trust through strong personal relationships is essential for the IPG and the relationship between the two countries.

Mr. Huizenga called the late Conservative MP Gord Brown, who was a former co-chair of the IPG, a “dear friend.”

Mr. Hoback said Mr. Brown had “such a great relationship down here–it was unreal.” He said when he was recently down in Washington, D.C. many U.S. politicians offered him their condolences.

In mid-May, a delegation of the Canadian section went to Washington, D.C. and met with more than 70 members of the House and the Senate.

Independent Senator Paul J. Massicotte (Quebec), a vice-chair of the IPG, said U.S. President Donald Trump is a bluffer, and he doesn’t always know all the details.

“He doesn’t let facts get in his way for a good argument. So you’ve got to repeat things and you’ve got to correct information people have,” Sen. Massicotte, who was on trip to Washington, told The Hill Times. “He’s very loose on the facts so you’ve go to keep correcting and…get good information out there.”

Independent Senator Yuen Pau Woo (British Columbia), a vice-chair of the IPG, said Canada’s ability to build relationships, communicate messages, and to build alliances with groups of Senators and members of the House of Representatives can be “very helpful” to Canada in its relationship with the United States.

“However, we are living in a period where the president, [and] the White House, is not very much aligned with members of Congress and the Senate, even members of his own party. And does not appear to heed advice from members of the two houses,” Sen. Woo, leader of the Independent Senators Group, told The Hill Times.

“So while we received a lot of sympathetic, indeed, supportive, encouraging hearings in Washington, D.C. from the folks that we met, it’s not clear that they are able to influence the White House,” he said.

“We have lots of friends in the House and in the Senate, but the guy in the White House, he’s just not getting the message,” Mr. Hoback said.

He said looking at the body language and facial expressions of his American counterparts, he can see their frustration that their message is not being heard, especially the Republicans.

“You can hear it in their voices and see it in their faces. They feel like they’ve hit the wall, hit the ceiling, they’re almost at wits end,” Mr. Hoback said. “I think they’re looking for different alternatives to see if there’s a way to push back and I guess we’ll see what that may look like in the future.”

Mr. Huizenga said he spoke briefly with U.S Vice-President Mike Pence and he wants to arrange a call or meeting with him in the “very near future” to “ tell him more fully [and] give him some feedback [on Canadian-American trade].”

“I would have loved to have been called in and had a one-on-one with the president or his folks to, maybe, lend a little bit of perspective,” he said.

Mr. Huizenga added, “I don’t speak for the government or the administration specifically. I may lend perspective on it. I may give insight on it. But ultimately its sort of my views of how our chamber is looking at this.”

Democrat Brian Higgins, the House Representative for New York’s 26^th district, told The Hill Times the State Department has been “emasculated” and has been centralized in the White House, which has hurt the diplomatic efforts of the IPG because “if you don’t have an adult to appeal to in the State Department that has some decision making authority, what good does it do?”

“It’s good that the [IGP] will continue to meet and it will persist. It will always be in effect and where there is good constructive dialogue that is helpful,” said Mr. Higgins. “What is not helpful is the inability for that group to take the concern, the agreement, the willingness to work together to a higher authority like the State Department because the State Department doesn’t have a lot of decision-making authority [anymore.]”

“If people think that this is a means to go to the administration, this is not the path for that,” Bruce Heyman, former U.S. ambassador to Canada in the Obama administration, said.

“[Conversation between Canada and U.S. IPG members] might not reach the level of the president. But this is not what it is actually for,” Mr. Heyman told The Hill Times when he was in Ottawa last week for the Canada 2020 conference.

“To communicate to the president there are other mechanisms. You go [to] the ambassador here. You go to the ambassador in Washington. You go to the Prime Minister’s Office. Even at the ministerial level, who will work directly with their counterparts in the executive branch in the cabinet.”

“This is meant as much for legislators who are creating legislation. Passing potential trade deals. Dealing with tariff deals. Deals with border laws. It gives an opportunity for them to get an understanding of these issues directly from their counterparts on the other side of the border. And to understand the political pressures that they face. Each of them have to face the voters on a regular basis, and so it also [gives] them an understanding of the pressures that they feel politically as well as understanding diplomatically and economically,” Mr. Heyman said. “It’s a very separate interaction that takes place.”

In an emailed statement, U.S. Ambassador to Canada Kelly Craft told The Hill Times, “The United States and Canada talk every day, at every level. The IPG is the premier forum for American and Canadian legislators to engage on an informal and formal basis. The IPG provides an important channel of communication for legislators to leverage their shared backgrounds, common history and purpose, and networks to achieve mutual goals and identify areas of cooperation. As Parliamentarians, they speak the same language and face the same challenges. Our legislators use this space to expand upon areas where we agree and use that cooperation to move toward bridging our differences.”

When the Canadian section of the IPG travels together they act in a non-partisan manner on behalf of Canada, say their members.

When they speak to their U.S. counterparts, “it’s team Canada,” Liberal MP Francesco Sorbara (Vaughan-Woodbridge, Ont.) told The Hill Times.

Last week, Mr. Sorbara was in Washington, D.C. with the House Finance Committee meeting for a review of the Proceeds of Crime Act. He said the topic of trade came up, but the focus was on the review.

“When we leave Canada, we’re Canadian, and we represent Canada, and the partisans politics stops there,” Mr. Hoback said on the phone from Alabama. “So if we have any disagreements, or anything like that, we bite our lips and we put up with them, and we do what we think is in the best interests of Canada as a whole.”

“That is very clear for all three parties,” he said.

“We’re there to represent the government. We’re not there to represent individual views,” Sen. Massicotte said.

Mr. Masse, who said he thinks Canada should take a harder line with the United States, agreed. But he also added, “we are not a tool of the government.”

He added that sometimes the Liberals treat the group as an extension of the government.

The IPG will hold a general meeting in Ottawa from June 15 to 16.

In a statement, Ms. Craft said, “U.S. legislators will travel to Ottawa from June 15 to 18, 2018 to discuss a range of bilateral and multilateral issues, including the economy, security, defence, and the environment.”

By NEIL MOSS.