are looking at the North American trade
the president last night touted the u.s.
MCA and the end of NAFTA at his rally in
Colorado last night look at this but
under this administration all of that is
changing the era of economic surrender
is over thank you last month we ended
the NAFTA catastrophe and I signed the
brand-new US Mexico Canada agreement
into law credible deal the u.s. MCA is a
gigantic victory for farmers ranchers
and manufacturers all across the great
state of Colorado and every other state
also you know something we got that
people don't talk about joining me right
now is the former prime minister of
Canada a Prime Minister Stephen Harper
mr. prime minister it's always a
pleasure to see you nice to see you
thanks so much for joining us so what
has been the impact of the anticipation
of us MC I mean the Canadians have
agreed to it but are we gonna see
passage I think you will eventually it's
a you know it's it's it's rude a bit
differently in Canada the the agreement
was a great victory for the Trump
administration for Canada you know
frankly people call it NAFTA 0.5 we
didn't really gain anything we gave up a
couple of things it's but when the
bottom line is it's still comprehensive
you know tariff free access to the
United States so it will pass eventually
but we have a as you know we have a
minority Parliament now so it's a
difficult political situation
yeah the politics getting in the way
once again what about the politics
around Huawei we've talked in the past
about the threat coming from China and
this administration has been very clear
that Huawei infrastructure means back
doors to all of our data back to the
communist government but there's Huawei
in Canada Huawei is a big commercial
provider in Canada but let's be clear
certainly when we were in government all
of our national security experts agreed
that deep penetration of Huawei into our
systems into government systems into 5g
networks would be an unequivocal threat
to national security we have to
understand why way is not a normal
private company it is an extension of
the Chinese surveillance state and
you know there there have to be limits
any Western society that allows Huawei
to go beyond certain limits that
endanger national security is being
extremely unwise so I hope that
ultimately our government will figure
that out so how come you know what's
what's with Canada having all of this
Huawei commercial providers you know so
permeating throughout the country and
what's with Europe that they've got this
infrastructure of Huawei as well do our
friends across the world not see foie
way the same way as though as the US
does views differ country to country I
think one of the challenges that Huawei
has good products and is a low-cost
provider partly because the government
subsidization and also murray i think
the other thing is partly because the
supply chain there's not a kind of
complete western supply chain in this
space and I do think ultimately that the
government of the United States is going
to have to work with allies to make sure
that there are Western providers of all
of these of all this equipment services
otherwise the pull towards Huawei will
get stronger and stronger this is a
really important point and it is a very
significant threat it will keep
following that another threat is Iran
the orders are headed to the polls today
in Iran the contest scene is a test for
president Hassan rouhani's popularity
amid this escalating political and
economic tension throughout the country
your reaction to that and what should be
done in terms of the threat from Iran
sir well let's be very clear about what
these elections do and don't mean you
will see in all kinds of other media
let's this assertion that this is
somehow a battle between reformers and
hardliners they're all hardliners you
can't unless you support the
dictatorship of the Ayatollah you cannot
be a candidate in these elections so
really the only tests here how many
turnout and is there really support for
the regime but there is no doubt that
the maximum pressure policies of the
Trump administration combined with some
of its recent actions are putting Iran
more and more in a corner and you know
look I think they deserve congratulation
for that and here to Europe is waffling
once again we've got you know the
Europeans buying or wanting to buy oil
and gas
from Iran you've got Chinese buying oil
and gas from from Iran
I think 70% of the exports out of Iran
are going to China we've got this
partnership with China and the u.s. is
putting sanctions on anybody who does
business with Iran and they're doing it
no problem it's it's all extremely
short-sighted on on the part of all of
these powers the single most dangerous
threat the world faces today is the
Iranian regime getting nuclear weapons
and frankly the entire world should be
working with the Trump administration to
bring as much pressure as is necessary
to prevent that from happening yeah you
would think what what are the threats
that we need to be aware of today we
just talked about China Iran but from a
country level what what do you see as
the most important issues not just the
US but Canada I think the single looked
a single most important threat in the
world today is nuclear proliferation and
the single most dangerous place in the
world for potentially having nuclear
weapons is he's not North Korea and my
judgment North Korea is serious but it
is Iran and it is Iran because you have
you would have for the first time a you
know frankly a theocratic regime that
might not be afraid to use nuclear
weapons I mean the you know there is
people in that regime believe if they
start a nuclear war Allah will come to
their defense and this would be the
first time in history you would have a
government in possession of nuclear
weapons for the purpose of using nuclear
weapons and that is something the world
cannot contemplate and and frankly the
jcpoa the previous agreement if you look
at its provisions it was a roadmap for
Iran to have nuclear weapons in 10 years
so administration was right to get out
with that but obviously there needs to
be a concerted strategy to really
prevent this from happening unbelievable
the president also released a Middle
East peace plan
recognizing Israeli settlements in the
West Bank six years after
israeli-palestinian talks collapsed in
2014 you reacted to that this is this is
Maria this is inseparable from the
Iranian issue what the administration
has really done there is brought
together Israelis and many of the Arab
states in a coalition and what they're
really saying is to the Palestinians you
know stop your intransigence go to the
bargaining table because frankly we have
a bigger problem too
which is Iran and you know this is
really now the ball is in the
Palestinians courts the air the Arabs
have been clear you know basically this
is what it's going to look like unless
the Palestinians engage so it's up to
them in the meantime
Israel the Arab states are going to
continue to work with the US
administration on fighting the Iranian
threat so many important issues Stephen
in terms of you know China and the
threats there in terms of terrorism and
the and the very dangerous situation
happening in Iran and and it's proxies
as well
and yet we see politics getting in the
way I mean this administration has been
talking about all of these threats but
the Congress has this resist movement on
is that the same thing that you see in
Canada right now where as you can't get
anything done because of politics well
it's it's a little bit of a different
situation you know I my party's in
opposition it's a minority government I
wouldn't say they're resistance the
government is just politics fact in the
matter is government's pursuing a series
of economic policies that are not good
for the country so in a parliamentary
system unlike your system in a
parliamentary system all of these votes
end up being confidence measures so you
know an opposition asks the way on the
one hand do we want to support the
government maybe a good individual
action but if we support the government
we keep it in office so what's the
better choice and you know that's the
that's a very different calculus in a
parliamentary system here in the United
States there's you know Congress can
Congress should be deciding these cases
on their merits because the
administration is gonna stay in office
one way or the other until the election
yeah and yet you've got real fights
going on in terms of policy and in terms
of very simple things like making sure
that people understand the China threat
making sure that people understand the
Iran Threat and yet you've got this
resist movement here that they will for
whatever reason they don't like
President Trump so they resist yeah I
think you know you've obviously got a
dynamic here you know this is my
observation as a as a foreigner that the
opposition to President Trump is so
intense and so personal that the
opponents are completely blinded as to
what it is he is not is or is not doing
to the point where
you know they're prepared to virtually
side with the Iranians on some of these
issues rather than support the
administration this is really crazy but
I think Maria might my observation is
this is why president Trump's
possibility of reelection keeps rising
and and under your leadership in Canada
you had real economic growth we're
looking at real economic growth here as
well and yet a big portion of the
country are saying oh well maybe we'll
try Bernie Sanders out and socialism
reforms yeah it mean it's it's actually
incredible I I find this you know as
somebody who's old enough to have lived
through the Cold War I find that
somebody would person would propose
socialism as an economic model today I
mean it has literally failed in every
single country it's been tried we look
at China governed by the Communist Party
but no longer according to a communist
economic model even they gave it up and
yet you have someone in the most
advanced country in the world undergoing
an economic boom proposing it and he's
leading the race for the party
but I think that's a testament to degree
to which the Democratic Party is out of
touch by the way before you go do you
think President Xi Jinping's tenure
could be challenged as a result of all
of these things coming at him
coronavirus the Hong Kong protesters or
dictator for life is dictator for life
he's he's in a pretty powerful position
but I think what this tells you if you
look at the coronavirus issue what's the
first instinct the first instinct is to
cover it up and deny it exist so
although everybody who says what a
brilliant system of political
decision-making need to remember this is
how dictatorships actually function they
tried to deny problems and they try to
cover up errors and we make lots of
mistakes and democracies but democratic
systems tend to be self-correcting and
by the way in doing so accelerated the
problem more people got the
coronaviruses note of the cover up Prime
Minister Harper it's good to see you
nice to see thanks so much Steven Hart