Price on trade: USMCA without the 'M'?

The chairman of a large American steel company called for Mexico to be dropped from USMCA at a steel industry conference last week. This follows earlier calls from members of Congress to reinstate Section 232 duties on Mexico. How did we get to this point?

In signing the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), the three parties signaled their intention to “support mutually beneficial trade.” However, the benefits of USMCA and the 2019 U.S.-Mexico Section 232 agreement on steel and aluminum are again tilting away from the United States. Worse still, Mexico is allowing the benefits of these agreements to flow to unintended beneficiaries.