However, on Monday US House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady said that he will continue to promote the benefits of free trade agreements with President-elect Donald Trump, including those offered under the Obama administration's Asian free trade deal.
Brady, a Republican, who described himself as a "champion of free trade," told a trade and politics forum that Trump will have to set his own priorities for trade, but these should include moves that pave the way for more US exports.
"I hope that he allows us to make the case that to grow our economy, it's just not enough to buy American. We have to sell American all through out the world," Reuters quotes US Rep. Brady from Texas as saying. "These trade agreements, done right, strictly enforced, level that playing field."
Commenting on the issue, Carl Thayer, Emeritus Professor of Politics at one of Australia's leading research and teaching universities, the University of New South Wales, told Sputnik that before tackling the free trade agreements, the President-Elect should give central stage to domestic politics, as the "constituency that he arose wants change."
"Not to make America better, not to be the number one power, he offered that hyperbole, but to overcome in the Rust Belts states. Their problems of the lack of jobs, unemployment and getting the American economy, which is recovering, to grow even better," he told Sputnik.
The political scientist however noted that this is not going to be a walkover.
Even though the Republicans hold the majority in both chambers of the US Congress, "they are not necessarily Trump's Republicans or Trumpists," he noted. In addition, the analyst explained to Sputnik why time is not on Trump's side.
Members of the House of Representatives, one of the chambers of the US Congress, serve two-year terms and are considered for reelection every even year.
Senators serve six-year terms and elections to the Senate, the other chamber of the bicameral Congress, are staggered over even years so that only about 1/3 of the Senate is up for reelection during any election.
Hence, he said, Trump should hurry up with his domestic policies.
When the rubber hits the road, it is the domestic policy which should overcome over the foreign policy, Carl Thayer finally stated.
