The Mexican Senate on Thursday ratified the modified North American free-trade agreement with the US and Canada after more than two years of arduous negotiations.
New additions introduced on Tuesday to the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) — which notably toughen the deal’s labor enforcement provisions — were rubber-stamped by 107 votes to one, making Mexico the first nation to sign the deal.
“We’re already done it in Mexico: The president has signed it and the Senate has ratified the USMCA,” Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador tweeted. “Now it is up to the US and Canadian legislatures to do the same. It’s good news.”
The path to ratification for the other two nations, expected early next year, also looks clear.
It replaces the 25-year-old North American Free Trade Agreement, which US President Donald Trump said had been “a disaster” for the US.
First signed in November last year, the USMCA got bogged down in political complications, particularly in the US, where opposition Democrats questioned whether it would really force Mexico to deliver on labor reforms meant to level the playing field between Mexican and American workers, but another year of talks produced a series of additions — notably tougher enforcement of labor provisions — that won the blessing of US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the key Democrat needed to move the agreement forward, as well as the largest US labor federation, the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations.
The deal was signed by US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer, Canadian Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland and Mexican Undersecretary for North America Jesus Seade at a ceremony in Mexico Tuesday.
During the debate in the Mexican Senate, lawmakers said that the new trade accord would stimulate the nation’s economy — which is forecast to contract this year — and instill confidence in investors.
The deal is a “historic act” for Mexico for its potential to create jobs, Mexican Senator Ricardo Monreal said.
Some opposition senators, while voting in favor of the accord, said that there should have been more time for debate, while others said free trade had made economic inequality more acute.
Mexican Senator Gustavo Madero of the opposition National Action Party welcomed the new agreement, saying its ratification “would send a signal of confidence in a delicate moment,” but he complained about having to vote “in a hurry” thanks to the “political times,” a reference to next year’s presidential election in the US.
The only vote against the USMCA came from independent Mexican Senator Emilio Alvarez Icaza, who described the deal as a giant “contradiction” to Lopez Obrador’s mandate and a “neoliberal triumph” — an ideology the president has promised to leave behind.
The USMCA includes rules designed to improve US auto workers’ competitiveness, requiring 40 percent of each duty-free vehicle to be made by people earning at least US$16 an hour.
The other additions include tougher measures to monitor environmental provisions and the removal of a requirement for the nations to provide at least 10 years of exclusivity for biologic drugs, which blocks cheaper generic versions.
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