Branches of the United States Government

Responsibilities of the Branches of the United States Government
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Responsibilities of the Branches of the United States Government
The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) is a 24-year-old trade pact deal among the United States, Canada, and Mexico. However, both the United States and Canada feel that the agreement sometimes hurt their citizens. For example, President Donald Trump thinks that Canada has steep tariffs on the United States’ dairy products (Wattles & Lobosco, 2018). Canadian Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, feels that he needs to protect Canada’s dairy products industry, and he can only achieve it by the steep tariffs. Such disagreements have led President Trump to reach a bilateral agreement with Mexico alone with the intention of excluding Canada if Canada does not do what he says. President Trump also asked the Congress not to ‘interfere’ with the negotiations, and if it does, he threatened to terminate NAFTA entirely.
The issue touches on the structure of the United States government. The United States government has three branches, each charged with specific tasks. Sometimes the duties collide, but this is in the spirit of avoiding dictatorship in the country. The system ensures that each branch can overturn the actions of another branch when it is necessary. For example, the president nominates judges and can refuse to consent to laws made by the Congress, the Congress makes laws, can reject president’s nominations, and even impeach him, and the judiciary can declare laws made by the Congress unconstitutional.

This system of checks and balances ensures that no branch acts ultra-vires.
The reason why President Trump asked the Congress to stay away from the negotiations is that he knows that the Congress has the power to reject the agreement. Nevertheless, he should not ask the Congress to stay away because its involvement would be for the wellbeing of the citizens. Even though the branches of government are equal in theory, this is not practical. More often than not, the president (executive) influences other branches’ decisions. Therefore, one can predict that the Congress will act according to President Trump’s expectations.

References
Wattles, J., & Lobosco, K. (2018, September 1). Trump again threatens to leave Canada out of new NAFTA deal. Retrieved from https://edition.cnn.com/2018/09/01/politics/nafta-trump-canada-mexico-deal/index.html