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People are now being prompted to discuss this by a rare political phenomenon: Presidents don’t usually threaten to cancel trade deals.

“I know those arguments (that he can’t do it). I happen to think (they’re) not right,” Bradley said in an interview, after the Oct. 27-28 conference.

“The bottom line is that for at least the last 100 years presidents have acted on behalf of the United States to decide whether to withdraw the United States from treaties… We don’t do it often, I should emphasize. It’s a rare event… (But) Congress has (almost) never objected.”

Trade deals are fundamentally the same, in his view, as other international treaties, like the Paris climate accord.

“There’s just nothing special about commerce,” Bradley said. “(Congress) could never make NAFTA… It could never make the Korea-U.S. agreement… I hate to be so critical, because I tried to listen hard (to the opposing argument)… But many people in the room … were puzzled by (it).”

Yet he admits to important unknowns.

One source of uncertainty is what would happen to the law Congress passed to implement NAFTA in 1994. Even if Trump pulls out, Bradley notes, no president can snap his fingers and make a law vanish.

Another unknown is whether Congress might take steps to stymie the president. It’s a remote possibility for now. But one idea floating around Washington’s pro-NAFTA ranks would involve Congress passing a bill to require a thorough study before any pullout.