Carney heads to Mexico in search of an ally — and opportunities

Prime Minister Mark Carney heads to Mexico Thursday with two separate, but related, goals.

The first is to find ways to work with Mexico to preserve North America-wide free trade, or at least as much of it as can be saved from the most protectionist U.S. administration in a century.

The second is to develop a bilateral trading relationship with Mexico that operates independently of the whims of the White House, and can survive whatever fate lies in store for the Canada-U.S.-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA) when its renegotiation finally happens.

The trip is expected to produce an agreement on a new Canada-Mexico comprehensive partnership and a security dialogue focused on issues such as transnational crime and drug-smuggling.

We are focused on elevating our partnerships in trade, commerce, security and energy, Carney said in a written statement before his departure for Mexico City. Together, we will build stronger supply chains, create new opportunities for workers and deliver greater prosperity and certainty for both Canadians and Mexicans.

But there has also been some turbulence in the relationship, as there was during U.S. President Donald Trump’s first term, and the trip is an effort to build trust between the two partners that neither will throw the other under the bus.

Mending fences with Mexico

The Mexicans are perhaps the ones with better reason to feel wary of the Canadian embrace.

“There’s been concerns in Mexico about statements that were made by premiers Doug Ford and Danielle Smith,said Laura Macdonald of Carleton University’s institute of political economy, and that members of the Trudeau government had also hinted we’d be better off without Mexico” soon after Trump’s re-election.

But Canadian leaders, both federal and provincial, seem to have dropped the notion that Canada can escape Trump’s sights by pushing Mexico out in front.

WATCH | Nov. 15, 2024: Alberta premier suggests cutting Mexico out of CUSMA:

Alberta premier joins pitch to cut Mexico from North American trade pact

November 15, 2024Alberta Premier Danielle Smith says Canada can’t ‘sacrifice’ its relationship with the U.S. if Mexico is a ‘trade irritant.’ She says she and the Ontario premier are ‘in sync’ on his pitch to pursue a bilateral deal with the U.S.

In August, Smith visited Mexico and appeared to do some fence-mending. Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne and Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand visited Mexico the same month and met with Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum, building on Carney’s bilateral talks at the G7 summit.

I think now, after some eight months of Trump, it’s become clear that Canada is not better off without Mexico, said Macdonald.

We really need to work with our partners and allies, the Mexicans, she said, given the unpredictability of Trump’s tariffs and other moves. Going at it separately from the Mexicans would just weaken us.

Bilateral trade growing

The trading relationship with Mexico has grown in recent years, though most of the growth has been in Mexican imports to Canada.

Canadian direct investment in Mexico, always big in the mining sector, has diversified as it has expanded.

For the first time this summer, more new cars entered Canada from Mexico than from the U.S., largely a function of automakers such as GM and Volkswagen sourcing cars from their Mexican plants to avoid Canadian counter-tariffs that apply to American, but not Mexican, vehicles.

This article is republished from RCI.