Trump economic advisor Kevin Hassett told CNBC on Monday that Canada is going to want in on the trade deal that U.S. negotiators are on the verge of crafting with Mexico.
"We're even closer" to reaching a trade deal with Mexico after Mexican negotiators were in Washington for most of last week, the chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors said.
Canada has not been part of the most recent talks to rework the 24-year-old North American Free Trade Agreement, which were expected to continue this week.
"I think what's going to happen after we close the Mexico deal is that Canada is going to look at it and see some stuff they like and maybe some stuff they want to modify," Hassett said on "Squawk Box." "But it's going to make it a lot easier to make a deal with Canada because we got a deal with Mexico."
On Friday, Mexico's economic minister said outstanding bilateral issues with the U.S. could be resolved midweek, adding that Canada could then rejoin negotiations.
Strained relations between the U.S. and Canada took a nosedive after the June Group of 7 summit in Quebec, which led to name-calling and accusations by President Donald Trump and a sharp rebuttal by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer on Thursday had expressed hope for a breakthrough with Mexico soon.
However, Trump, alongside Lighthizer, said he was in "no rush" to conclude talks on NAFTA, which started about a year ago and has missed deadline after deadline.
Talks moved slowly and stalled in the run-up to the July 1 presidential election in Mexico, which yielded a landslide victory for veteran leftist Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador.
— Reuters contributed to this report.