Mexican Economic Secretary Ildefonso Guajardo said Friday that his country had a history of effectively defending its own interests when it came to the steel trade. The statement was a subtle warning to the U.S. not to include Mexico in the steel and aluminum tariffs President Trump signed Thursday.
“More than two years ago, in the face of excess capacity in global steel production, Mexico took timely and effective measures to defend our industry, increasing our tariffs towards the countries generating this overcapacity. As a result of these actions, we redirected our imports of steel to North America, proving that it is possible to address this problem and comply with our international commitments within the framework of the World Trade Organization,” Guajardo said in a statement.
He added that his country agreed that there was a problem of overcapacity in the global steel trade steel industry at the global level, and will continue working in the search for a long-term solution such as the North American Steel Trade Committee.
The White House pointedly excluded its North American Free Trade Agreement partners, Canada and Mexico, from the 25 percent steel tariff and 10 percent aluminum tariff President Trump signed Thursday. A senior administration official speaking on background told reporters that the White House was reserving the right to apply the tariffs later on and made clear that this was contingent on the trade partners making concessions in the ongoing NAFTA renegotiations.
“Essentially, what we are doing is giving Canada and Mexico sufficient time to address these issues at the request of the governments but it is not open-ended. We fully expect this to be resolved in a short enough time period … to allow constructive discussions,” the official said.
The official did not however specifically say that this required that concessions in NAFTA relate to steel and aluminum. The source said that if the countries came up with “alternate means” to address the U.S.’s concerns then the administration would “flexibly modify the orders.”
Guajardo did not directly respond, stating only, “The negotiation process for the modernization of NAFTA follows its normal course as per the instructions of the Ministers at the end of the 7th round recently held in Mexico City.”
The U.S., Canada, and Mexico concluded the seventh round of talks to renegotiate NAFTA this week. The U.S. trading partners have resisted most of the administration’s proposals to rework the 1993 deal and White House officials have been clearly frustrated.
