Negotiators from the U.S., Canada, and Mexico are meeting to discuss the USMCA trilateral trade deal that went into effect on July 2020, during the first Donald Trump administration.
When it was signed, the pact had a mandatory six-year joint review clause.
But while politicians and bureaucrats will be the ones participating in the negotiations, the auto industry is one of the biggest stakeholders in these talks, and executives from the biggest U.S. automakers are making their positions publicly clear.
The auto industry is the largest component of total trade in North America, accounting for 22% of USMCA trade and employing 9.7 million people directly and another 11 million throughout the supply chain just in the U.S.
Ford CEO Jim Farley wants the USMCA to be more fair
Ford CEO Jim Farley has been outspoken about what his company wants from the USMCA negotiations for weeks.
At the international meeting, he said that he wants automakers that produce most of their vehicles domestically, like Ford, to be rewarded under the new deal while competitors that produce domestically, but also import a large portion of their vehicles, like Toyota and GM, should face stiffer penalties.
“It’s imperative that any new agreement makes it easier, not harder, to compete with U.S. makers who import from Japan, South Korea and global competitors that import from those locations. That’s the key for us,” Farley told CNBC Wednesday.
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GM, which led the U.S. in auto sales in 2025, imported 1.17 million vehicles, or 41% of its U.S. sales. Toyota imported more than 1.19 million units, or 47% of its domestic sales, CNBC reported.
Ford, on the other hand, assembled more than 2 million vehicles in the U.S. last year, more than any other OEM, and imported just 378,000, or 17% of the 2.2 million it sold in the U.S.
“Ford’s a leader of U.S. auto production with the most U.S.-built vehicles but, more importantly, we import very few, and we export the most, and we have the most UAW [union] workers here,” Farley said. “So we’re very proud, especially of the ratio between what we build here and what we import.”
Last year’s tariffs added $41 billion to the cost of vehicles and parts, according to JPMorgan. Those costs amounted to an increase of about $2,580 per vehicle, or about 5.8% of the average retail price.
“Really, our priority is to be able to import parts, build as much as we can in our country, but import parts to make the vehicles as affordable as possible,” Farley told another news outlet recently.
“So what we’ll be looking for in the new negotiation is really making sure that if a vehicle is imported from Mexico and Canada, it is done on a level playing field,” he said. “So if you’re not compliant with USMCA, it should be very expensive to do that. If a company decides not to be compliant with the legislation, then it should be a lot more expensive.”
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UAW continues opposition to USMCA
With more than a fifth of the trade under the USMCA trilateral trade agreement coming from the automotive industry, the United Auto Workers union and its 400,000 active members are among the biggest stakeholders in these negotiations.
UAW President Shawn Fain was wearing a “Kill NAFTA” T-shirt during a video call last month, according to the Wall Street Journal, when he made his union’s opposition to the agreement clear.
“Where it didn’t eliminate jobs entirely, it slashed wages and benefits,” Fain said of the USMCA. “There is no future for the U.S. working class that doesn’t address the free-trade disaster.”
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The UAW believes the USMCA should completely overhaul the requirement that 40% to 45% of the auto content must be made by workers earning at least $16 per hour. That requirement guarantees that Mexican auto workers receive pay equal to that of their U.S. counterparts.
Fain says that scrapping that requirement would help curb job offshoring and improve conditions for Mexican workers.
Fain also wants a revised USMCA to toughen penalties on companies that violate workers’ rights and to set quotas requiring companies to manufacture a larger share of vehicles and components in the country where they are sold.
Meanwhile, Farley says he has been in contact with the UAW and appreciates their point of view.
“The good thing is Ford is respected. We’ve earned that respect,” Farley said.
Related: Leading auto CEO lays out USMCA strategy ahead of July deadline