The United States - Mexico Relations in the Context of the USMCA Agreement Ratification

Abstract

The research is devoted to the consideration of the US-Mexican relations in the context of ratification of a new trilateral US - Mexico - Canada trade agreement - USMCA, that replaced NAFTA. Since the end of 2018, after the singing of USMCA and the general elections of Mexican President, the US-Mexican relations during 2019 developed under challenging conditions of political confrontation, which consisted in the pressure of US president D. Trump Administration and the US Congress on the Mexican government to include additional conditions in the agreement, related to the Mexican workers’ salary, new rules of origin for Mexican goods, customs duties on steel and aluminium, evaluation of the cost of pharmaceutical products, the increase in environmental standards, as well as the inclusion of government measures to stop transit migration from Central America to the USA through Mexican territory. These innovations in bilateral relations determine the relevance of this article. The purpose of the study is to assess the changes that have occurred in the bilateral relations while the states were discussing the terms of USMCA agreement and the first two years of its application. As a method, a comparative analysis of texts was used, including interim negotiations results between the heads of states, trade representatives, and the representatives of the Mexican Foreign Ministry and the US State Department, texts of speeches by parliamentarians, and materials from the American and Mexican media. The article highlights the changes in the US-Mexican relations during 2019-2021 after USMCA ratification, and provides the author’s forecast of their development in the near future, considering the strict American trade requirements to Mexico that formed in the process. The author comes to the conclusion that the United States will be guided by its own interests and may unfairly fulfil some of the conditions of USMCA agreement.