16th Congressional District candidates discuss NAFTA and immigration policy

The candidates in the race for the 16th Congressional District in El Paso discussed health care, immigration and the North American Free Trade Agreement during a forum Wednesday.

John Carrillo, Norma Chavez, Veronica Escobar, Dori Fenenbock, Enrique Garcia and Rick Seeberger
were asked several questions during the hour-long forum.

North American Free Trade Agreement

About 14 million U.S. jobs depend on trade with Canada and Mexico, according to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. President Donald Trump has said the agreement does not favor the US and renegotiations are underway.

All candidates agreed NAFTA needs to continue to be negotiated

“El Paso needs to be at the forefront of the conversations on NAFTA. We need to deal with the reality and the numbers that the department of commerce can provide regarding economic development opportunities,” Chavez said.

“We need to maintain NAFTA, which is absolutely essential to the progress of our community and our state,” Carrillo said.

“We need to renegotiate NAFTA. We cannot get rid of it NAFTA is very crucial to our area. El Paso needs to capitalize on that. We need to improve our infrastructure and we need to use NAFTA as a roadway to do that,” Garcia said.

“We need leadership from the highest levels of government. This is what happens when we elect a president who trashes our most significant trading partner. So in the absence of leadership from our president we have to make sure that communities like ours voice our opinions and step up and talk about the issues to our legislatures,” Escobar said.

“Making the threat to withdraw gets everybody’s attention. We need to get attention, we need to get both sides Mexico and the United States and Canada to understand that sometimes things go for a long time need to be revisited to make sure we are focused on the future and not the past and that the trade agreement is good for all parties,” said Seeburger.

“We need to look at a win win solution for free trade and continue to expand on the investments that have been made in El Paso. 1 in every 5 dollars is touched in some way by the maquila and cross border trade. That’s an extraordinary advantage for El Paso and we need to continue the investments,” Fenenbock said.

Immigration Reform

During Tuesday’s State of the Union address, President Donald Trump touted a path to citizenship for 1.8 million illegal immigrants who were brought by their parents illegally at a young age but he still wants to build a great wall on the southern border.

The Congressional candidates feel immigration policy and border security should not be lumped together in one package.

“We cannot build a wall on the backs of DACA dreamers,” Chavez said.

“Those are two very separate things. We do not need a wall. We need to maintain bilateral trade between the U.S. and Mexico,” Carillo said.

“I think he’s essentially holding DACA recipients hostage. He’s even gone further and talked about changes to legal immigration, something that was not on the table prior. The challenge with this president is that it seems like there are shifting sands all the time,” Escobar said.

“I think the wall is dealing with the securing of the U.S. so I do believe that immigration and border security go hand and hand together because you really don’t have one without the other,” Seeburger said.

“We cannot to leverage our children for a border wall. We need border security but we need compassionate sensible immigration reform, we need a permanent legislative fix for our dreamers,” Fenenbock said.

“A wall no matter how tall or how wide is not going to have any effect other than isolate us from our neighbors. We need to keep that relationship and establish it and make is stronger rather than weaker. We are not Germany,” Garcia said.