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DALLAS — Canada’s trade minister said Monday that some progress is being made on a nagging trade issue with the United States, while U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk said a tangled dispute with Mexico over cross-border trucking and California Christmas trees might resolve itself next year. Welcoming Cabinet-level Mexican and Canadian trade officials to the city where he served as mayor, Kirk said language that removed funding for the Mexican truck program has been restored in next year’s budget bill. "We won’t be handcuffed by prohibitory language," he said. When the border was closed to 500 U.S.-certified trucks in a...

GUADALAJARA, Mexico – President Barack Obama pressed for a new tone in the United States' relationship with Mexico but found no immediate progress Sunday on the divisions between him and Mexican President Felipe Calderon over the pace of U.S. drug-fighting aid and a ban on Mexican trucks north of the border. Obama kicked off his second trip to Mexico as president with a friendly 45-minute meeting with Calderon that touched on the vast trade relationship between their two countries, their cooperation on swine flu and the violent Mexican gangs dominating the drug trade on both sides of the border. Their...

WASHINGTON -- U.S. business groups are growing increasingly frustrated with President Barack Obama's failure to resolve a cross-border trucking dispute with Mexico they say has threatened thousands of American jobs. "We've got companies that are really concerned," said Frank Vargo, vice president for international economic affairs at the National Association of Manufacturers. "Our calculation is that we've got 15,000 jobs at risk and the longer this goes on, the more likely it is that Mexican buyers are shifting suppliers," Vargo said. U.S. manufacturers hold out hope Obama's meeting early next week in Guadalajara with Mexican President Felipe Calderon and Canadian...

A plan containing guidelines on getting Mexican trucks back on U.S. highways has gone through bureaucratic review, the first step toward ending Mexican tariffs on $2.4 billion worth of U.S. goods. Implementing the plan would quell growing dissent among U.S. businesses that are hurt by Mexico's tariffs and that continue to besiege Washington with claims that doing nothing will result in job losses. The tariffs were imposed as retaliation for legislation enacted in March that took Mexican trucks off American highways, despite the North American Free Trade Agreement's program to let them into the United States.

Trucking Headlines U.S.-Mexico trucking plan may resumeBy Jill Dunn The United States may allow Mexican trucks to do business here as early as June, U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood reportedly said May 22. This spring, Congress ended the cross-border trucking program between the two countries. Mexico responded with 90 tariffs totaling $2.4 billion on U.S. products, casting a heavy burden on U.S. producers, LaHood said in a Bloomberg story. Candice Tolliver, the new communications director for the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, did not immediately respond to questions. In recent weeks, the FMCSA began work with the U.S. Trade...

Signs showing an integrated North America have begun showing up on U.S. Interstate highways for NORPASS, a new electronic system that allows participating truckers in Canada and the U.S. to by-pass roadside weigh stations through the use of a transponder mounted on the windshield. The NORPASS website describes the organization as "a partnership of state and provincial agencies and trucking industry representatives who are committed to promoting safe and efficient trucking throughout North America. Truckers that register to participate in NORPASS receive a small transponder that signals to a computer in participating weigh stations. As the participating truck approaches the...

GENEVA (Reuters) – The prompt resolution of a 15-year old dispute over access to U.S. roads by Mexican trucks could be another casualty of the deadly swine flu outbreak, international trade experts said on Monday. Increased health checks to control the virus, which has killed 103 people in Mexico and infected at least 20 in the United States, could also slow the passage of goods across the busy but troubled U.S.-Mexico border, they said. The United States imported around $216 billion of goods from Mexico in 2008, making its southern neighbor its third-largest trading partner after Canada and China, according...

Anyone worried that, once in charge, Democrats wouldn't be vigilant in protecting our southern border can relax. The grave threat of Mexican long-haul truckers has been shut down. With any luck, Mexicans will never have the temerity to attempt to deliver commercial goods into the United States again. At least such is the fervid hope of the Teamsters, the fiercest adversary the Mexicans have faced since President James K. Polk sent Winfield Scott south in the Mexican-American War. The union can't abide Mexican trucks because they represent competition, and so they must be blocked - legal obligations, economic rationality and...

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Wednesday sent a letter to the California congressional delegation urging it to restore the recently ended pilot program that allowed Mexican trucks to transport goods in the United States. "In this time of economic distress, when more than one in 10 Californians are out of work and the repercussions are felt throughout our great state, we must do all we can to boost trade with our international partners, not stifle it," Schwarzenegger wrote. "And yet I am afraid that the prohibition recently placed on Mexican truckers will do exactly that, with the result being markets functionally...

U.S. President Barack Obama's administration hopes to assemble a proposal to resolve a trucking dispute with Mexico before he visits the country in mid-April, an official said on Tuesday.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said a new program to allow Mexican truckers to cross the border will be unveiled "soon," a move that could spur Mexico to rescind tariffs on $2.4 billion of American products. Mr. LaHood is on his way to Capitol Hill today, where he will meet with lawmakers in an effort to reach agreement on a new plan. In a recent spending bill signed by President Barack Obama, Congress shut down a pilot program that allowed some Mexican truckers to operate on American roads. Mexico responded last week by slapping tariffs on roughly 90 kinds of products...

Talk about shades of Smoot-Hawley, the 1930 tariff act that was designed to protect American jobs but, not too surprisingly, crippled industries relying on international trade when other nations retaliated. Production kept on plunging and unemployment kept on rising, extending the Depression. In today's extremely global economy, we shudder to think how much worse the consequences today might be. The Mexican trade war may just be getting revved up, thanks to the Obama administration and the Democrat-controlled Congress ending a Bush administration pilot program that allowed a limit of 97 Mexican long-haul truck drivers into the United States (whereas, under...

Anyone worried that, once in charge, Democrats wouldn’t be vigilant in protecting our southern border can relax. The grave threat of Mexican long-haul truckers has been shut down. With any luck, Mexicans will never have the temerity to attempt to deliver commercial goods into the United States again. At least such is the fervid hope of the Teamsters, the fiercest adversary the Mexicans have faced since Pres. James Polk sent Winfield Scott south in the Mexican-American War. The union can’t abide Mexican trucks because they represent competition, and so they must be blocked — legal obligations, economic rationality, and diplomatic...

At least 17 of the 20 major nations that vowed at a November summit to avoid protectionist steps that could spark a global trade war have violated that promise, with countries from Russia to the United States to China enacting measures aimed at limiting the flow of imported goods, according to a World Bank report unveiled yesterday. The report underscores a "worrying" trend toward protectionism as countries rush to shield their ailing domestic industries during the global economic crisis. It comes one day after Mexico vowed to slap new restrictions on 90 U.S. products. That action is being taken in...

President Obama is facing his first trade war after Mexico slapped import tariffs on $2.4 billion in U.S. goods in retaliation for a ban on its trucks from American roads. Congress ignited the trade skirmish last week by killing a pilot program begun in 2007 that had allowed a few Mexican 18-wheelers to deliver goods across the border. "Right now, these trade agreements are contracts and if either side breaks that contract, there's repercussions," said Rep. Kevin Brady, R-Texas, the top Republican on the trade subcommittee of the House Ways and Means Committee. Economy Secretary Gerardo Ruiz Mateo imposed the...

MEXICO CITY (AFP) — Mexico on Monday said it would place tariffs on nearly 90 US products after Washington canceled a program that allowed some trucks from Mexico to operate in the United States. There is to be an "increase in customs duty on almost 90 industrial and agricultural products," Economy Minister Gerardo Ruiz Mateos said in a statement. Ruiz said the increase would represent some 2.4 billion dollars, but did not name the products. . . . . . The move drew a sharp rebuke from US Senator John McCain, who said he regretted Mexico's decision and also lashed...

Mexico says it will increase tariffs on about 90 U.S. products in retaliation for decision to cancel program that allowed some Mexican trucks to transport goods within the U.S.

One day after signing the $410 billion omnibus funding bill into law, along with provisions ending the Department of Transportation's Mexican truck demonstration project, the Obama administration has announced intentions to restart the program as soon as possible.

<p>The Obama administration will try to reinvent a program to allow Mexican trucks full access to U.S. highways.</p> <p>An 18-month-old pilot program that allowed a few Mexican trucks beyond a border buffer zone died when President Barack Obama signed a sweeping $410 billion government spending bill on Wednesday. The bill barred spending on the pilot program.</p>

The U.S. Department of Transportation will make no attempt to stop Sen. Byron Dorgan's effort to kill the Cross Border Demonstration Project, The Trucker learned Friday afternoon. Earlier this week, Dorgan, a Democrat from North Dakota, included language in the Fiscal Year 2009 Omnibus Appropriations bill that the senator said would finally bring to an end “the Mexican long-haul trucking program in the U.S. started by the Bush Administration.” The bill, not to be confused with the stimulus package, allocates federal funds for the remainder of the fiscal year. Sources have told The Trucker that LaHood has indicated he will...

DALLAS — Union officials were confident Tuesday that new legislation in Congress would halt Mexican trucks from making long-haul trips into the United States. A $410 billion spending bill House Democrats presented Monday includes language that would prevent Mexican-licensed trucks from traveling beyond commercial zones along the U.S.-Mexico border. The wording is aimed at ending a pilot program backed by the Bush administration that permitted up to 500 U.S.-certified trucks access deep into the U.S. "This is a really big win for us," said Leslie Miller, an International Brotherhood of Teamsters spokeswoman. "Historically, there has been very, very strong support"...

The Obama Administration will end the Department of Transportation's cross border trucking program, Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., a staunch opponent of the project, predicted Friday. "Both President-elect Obama and Vice-President-elect Biden voted to end the program in 2007, and it is expected that the new administration will uphold the intent of Congress and shut down the program in 2009," Dorgan said in a statement. The program, which allows trucks from the United States and Mexico to drive beyond commercial border zones is part of the North American Free Trade Agreement but has garnered bi-partisan criticism from lawmakers and others on...

Big business wants Mexican truckers delivering goods here in this country. Why? For the same reason it supports illegal immigration: Businesses don’t want to pay a decent wage to the American worker. This isn’t a conspiracy, but it has spawned a hydra-headed monster of conspiracy theories.Heard the one about the North American Union and that NAFTA Highway? Like all conspiracies, this one starts with a basis in fact then spirals off on a weird tangent, producing new twisted offshoots as it goes. The NAFTA Superhighway is just a network of existing roads that are approved for the Mexican Truck Pilot...

WASHINGTON — Dismissing a White House veto threat, the House voted Tuesday to end a pilot program giving Mexican trucks access to U.S. highways. The Bush administration stressed that the United States is obligated, under the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement, to open up American roads to Mexican truckers, and that terminating the year-old demonstration project would have repercussions for American trucks allowed into Mexico. Passage of the House bill, it said "would pose significant and immediate risks to U.S. interests." But the pilot project, which permits up to 500 trucks from 100 Mexican companies access to U.S. roads,...

Infuriated Democrats vowed Monday to kill a pilot program that gives Mexican trucks access to U.S. highways after the Bush administration - acting on the first day of Congress' summer recess - announced that it was extending the test project. Rep. James L. Oberstar, chairman of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, said the administration's maneuver was the latest attempt to flout the will of Congress on the matter, and said he will introduce legislation ending the program once and for all. "When Congress reconvenes in September, I intend to have the full House of Representatives approve our bill as quickly...

WASHINGTON – A controversial one-year program allowing Mexican trucks to travel deep into the United States will be extended for two more years, federal officials announced Monday. John H. Hill, administrator of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, said the extension would allow for the collection of more data to determine whether Mexican trucks can operate safely in the United States. Opponents quickly denounced the move, which some had been expecting despite their protests that the program poses a danger on U.S. highways. Rep. James Oberstar, D-Minn., chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, accused U.S. Transportation Secretary Mary...

WASHINGTON – Opponents of a pilot project that allows Mexican trucks to travel throughout the United States took another step toward ending the program yesterday, when a House committee approved a bill to bar its continuation next year. The bill could get a vote by the full House when lawmakers return from their summer break in September. “We believe it's time to end the program,” said Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., the chief sponsor of the bill. DeFazio blasted the Bush administration for ignoring a law passed by Congress last year to end the pilot program. He said lax safety standards...

WASHINGTON – A senator wants Congress' investigative arm to determine whether the Transportation Department has broken the law by spending federal money on a program allowing Mexican trucks on U.S. roads. Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., called for the investigation by the General Accountability Office a few hours after Transportation Secretary Mary Peters warned of economic losses if Mexican trucks are prohibited from driving deep into the U.S. Peters has been fighting in court to prevent the program's end. But Dorgan and others say Congress prohibited spending money on the program last year. “When Congress passes a law that says no...

A federal appeals court considered Tuesday whether the Bush administration can go ahead with a pilot program that allows a small number of Mexican trucks to travel freely on U.S. highways, despite a new law by Congress against it. Members of the Teamsters Union and their supporters packed a courtroom at 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, where an apparently divided three-judge panel heard arguments in the case, which may boil down to the meaning of "establish." Several tractor trailers also were parked outside the courthouse and union members and their supporters carried signs opposing the program, which allows participating...

Trucks hauling everything from cars to produce use Southeast Texas roads to deliver their goods, and when a proposed Interstate 69/Trans Texas Corridor is completed, local drivers could see even more of them, local transportation officials said. The proposed I-69 corridor stretches from Michigan down to Texas. Once in Texas, the corridor goes about 650 miles from Texarkana to Brownsville and Laredo and includes separate lanes for cars and semis and areas for trains and utilities. It doesn't cut through Beaumont, but local arteries like U.S. 69 and Interstate 10 would connect to it. Travelers and truckers just need to...

WASHINGTON – In her first public statements on the Mexican trucking controversy, U.S. Transportation Secretary Mary Peters defended yesterday the pilot program that allows Mexican trucks to travel throughout the United States in defiance of a congressional order. U.S. officials also responded to complaints that a Mexican carrier that withdrew from the program several days ago never should have qualified because of an allegedly poor safety record. Peters got an earful of criticism from several lawmakers during a House appropriations transportation subcommittee hearing on President Bush's proposed budget. Rep. Marcy Kaptur, D-Ohio, accused Peters of being in violation of the...

BELLVILLE — In what is becoming a regular occurrence in Southeast Texas, more than 1,000 Austin County residents and interested outsiders jammed a county fairgrounds exhibit hall Monday night to let a panel of state transportation officials know that the Trans-Texas Corridor was not welcome here. State Rep. Lois Kolkhorst, R-Brenham, opened the public remarks to thunderous applause when she told the panel, "You all thought I was crazy in Austin when I said my people don't want it and I don't want it." The panel, which included Texas Department of Transportation Executive Director Amadeo Saenz and Deputy Executive Director...

Gov. Rick Perry's ambitious Trans-Texas Corridor plan, and his advocacy of toll funding for future roads, hit the skids in a skeptical Legislature last spring. The road shows no signs of getting any smoother as state transportation officials try to sell the plan to Houston-area audiences. "This will wipe me out," Dee Bond told a panel of corridor advocates at a town hall meeting in Rosenberg last week. The panel, which included Texas Transportation Commissioner Ned Holmes of Houston and Steve Simmons, deputy executive director of the Texas Department of Transportation, was there to explain and gather comment on a...

In a letter dated January 3, 2007, written to DOT Secretary Mary Peters, Senator Byron Dorgan (D-ND) expressed concern that DOT planned to continue the program. “The DOT response is both arrogant and wrong! The provisions included in the omnibus spending bill was clearly written and designed to put the brakes on the current pilot program,” reads the letter. “Failure to end the pilot program, I believe, will put the Department of Transportation in direct violation of federal law,” said Dorgan in the letter.

Like it or not, Mexican trucks will continue making deliveries into the United States interior despite congressional efforts to block their passage. Congress voted last year to stop funding for a cross-border trucking pilot program, however, last week, the Bush administration argued that while the congressional action bans funding for a new program it does nothing to stop the current one. “The current cross-border trucking demonstration project will continue to operate in a manner that puts safety first, with participating Mexican carriers subject to all safety standards required by the 2008 omnibus bill and the department, while giving U.S. trucking...

Bush Administration Defies New Law by Continuing Pilot Program WASHINGTON, Jan. 7 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Bush administration broke yet another law in continuing to allow long-haul trucks from Mexico to use U.S. highways, according to a letter filed Monday by the Teamsters Union in the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco. Congress passed an omnibus budget, signed into law Dec. 26, that includes a provision banning funds "to establish a cross-border motor carrier demonstration program to allow Mexico-domiciled motor carriers to operate beyond the commercial zones." The Bush administration pretends the law doesn't apply to the existing program....

A constitutional crisis is developing between Congress and the Department of Transportation over the federal government's decision to continue its project allowing Mexican trucks on U.S. roads, in defiance of new legislation. "The DOT response is both arrogant and wrong!" Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., wrote in a letter yesterday to Secretary of Transportation Mary Peters. Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration officials told the San Diego Union Tribune the cross-border Mexican truck demonstration project would continue because the program was established in September and the amendment allows programs that have already begun to continue. But Dorgan insisted a provision in the...

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration is going ahead with a controversial pilot program giving Mexican trucks greater access to U.S. highways despite a new law by Congress against it. The decision to proceed with the four-month-old program, which allows participating Mexican trucking companies to send loads throughout the United States, comes despite language in the recently signed catchall spending bill aimed at blocking it. But the Department of Transportation is taking advantage of a loophole in the new law, which prohibits the government from spending any money to "establish" the program. The government says the new rules don't apply to...

Mexico City — Farmers and activists here are planning a series of protests as NAFTA enters its final stage on New Year's Day, when the last tariffs and quotas on corn, beans, milk and sugar melt away. Opponents of the free trade agreement warn that the final lifting of trade barriers could spark even more migration from Mexico's devastated countryside and leave Mexico dependent on the United States for corn and beans, staple dishes since the age of the Aztecs. At least one peasant group has said the NAFTA expansion could spark armed rebellion in the countryside if President Felipe...

Congress has passed a bill that cuts funding for the controversial Mexican truck program, but lawmakers expect the Bush administration to keep the foreign vehicles rolling on American roads amid safety and security concerns. Joe Kasper, spokesman for Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., told WND that "without federal funding, it will be difficult to continue the program. However, we must expect that the administration will continue looking for ways to do so." The newly passed 2008 Consolidated Appropriations Act prohibits the Department of Transportation from using the funds in it "to establish a cross-border motor carrier demonstration program to allow Mexico-domiciled...

Congress has passed a bill that cuts funding for the controversial Mexican truck program, but lawmakers expect the Bush administration to keep the foreign vehicles rolling on American roads amid safety and security concerns. Joe Kasper, spokesman for Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., told WND that "without federal funding, it will be difficult to continue the program. However, we must expect that the administration will continue looking for ways to do so." The newly passed 2008 Consolidated Appropriations Act prohibits the Department of Transportation from using the funds in it "to establish a cross-border motor carrier demonstration program to allow Mexico-domiciled...

WASHINGTON – The Mexican government is considering blocking U.S. exports, such as pork and rice, should Congress cut off funding for a cross-border trucking program, as is expected to happen within days. Even if Congress ends funding for the contentious program through the catch-all spending bill that is under consideration, there is a growing expectation that the Bush administration will find a way to continue it in what some say would be an act of defiance and others say would be compliance with the law. “We anticipate that they'll find a way to keep it going,” said Leslie Miller, a...

WASHINGTON, Dec. 19 --Teamsters General President Jim Hoffa today praised Congress for banning funds for the Bush administration's reckless pilot program to let trucks from Mexico travel freely on U.S. highways. The ban was part of the omnibus spending bill that Congress passed Wednesday. The Teamsters opposed the pilot project from the start because of real concerns that trucks from Mexico aren't safe. "Congress just made driving safer in the United States by ensuring that dangerous trucks from Mexico aren't lurching along our highways like unguided missiles," Hoffa said. "We expect the Bush administration to obey the law and put...

The long list of opponents to the cross-border trucking program isn’t exclusively made up of groups and truckers in the United States. Motor carriers in Mexico are waging their own fight to shut down the program. In fact, the Mexican National Truck Drivers Federation is planning to block the border between Mexico and the United States in January 2008 if the program doesn’t come to an end. The threat to block the border was reported in the Mexican newspaper El Financiero. The union of truckers is upset with the Mexican government for allowing U.S. trucks and truckers into their country....

It's been a few weeks since our highways were opened to Mexican trucks. I'm on hwy 85 occasionally and I've been looking for Mexican plates. Haven't seen any. Anyone out there, closer to the border roads, noticing traffic? Do Mexican trucks have to have identifying plates, or are the plates changed after they cross the border?

FMCSA's website lists 10 Mexican carriers with a total of 55 trucks that are approved to transport goods throughout the U.S. The FMCSA was asked to comment but did not reply to phone calls or e-mails. About 40 more Mexican carriers will soon join the 10 already approved. The agency, according to its website, said it "has notified an additional 37 Mexico-domiciled motor carriers that they have successfully passed a Pre-Authorization Safety Audit." The FMCSA says there are four U.S. carriers participating in the cross-border program. Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., continues to show frustration with the Bush administration. His spokesman,...

WASHINGTON — The president can't do it, nor the Supreme Court. Only the Congress has the power to levy taxes and spend public money, perhaps the most basic task of governance. Legislators, however, return this week from their Thanksgiving recess having put into law just one out of the 12 giant spending bills that make up the 2008 federal budget. Congress breaks again, this time for the year, in just two more weeks. "That's not really a lot of time to squeeze in nearly a year's worth of unfinished business," President Bush said Monday. "The end of 2007 is approaching...

Members of the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association say they have documented hundreds of safety violations by Mexican trucks rolling on U.S. roads under the Department of Transportation's Mexican truck demonstration project. "The Department of Transportation is allowing Mexican long-haul rigs to operate in the United States without requiring U.S. rules and regulations to be enforced," Rick Craig, the director of regulatory affairs for the group, told WND in a telephone interview yesterday. "The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration is providing exemptions from U.S. safety rules that the FMCSA claim are covered in a Memorandum of Understanding between the United States...

SAN DIEGO – Saying he was here to fight for the safety of America's roads, Teamsters union General President Jim Hoffa led a rally Wednesday morning at the Otay Mesa border crossing to protest a pilot program that allows long-haul trucking across the U.S.-Mexico border. “The big money boys want to have trucks coming through here that are dangerous,” Hoffa said over cheers from dozens of Teamsters and the roar from Mexican trucks leaving the U.S. inspection station on Enrico Fermi Drive. “Wake up America, fight back,” Hoffa told supporters. The pilot project, which has been up and running since...

Mexican trucks crossing into the U.S. as part of a controversial pilot project will monitored by GPS satellite technology beginning this month. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) announced the plan to track the trucks as they pick up and deliver their loads. The decision to require the installation of satellite tracking -- to be provided by Qualcomm -- was made after members of Congress expressed a desire to know whether Mexican participants in the demonstration program are complying with U.S. federal safety and trade laws. FMCSA says it will initially spend approximately $367,000 to outfit all trucks from...