USMCA activity

This post is way political. Hold onto your hat.

Washington activity is detected following a letter delivered to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi from Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez-Obrador (AMLO). This is the second of such letters. Trump's economic team and AMLO are working together against Pelosi's team and AFL-CIO Richard Trumka.

Pelosi and Trumka are working to obstruct advancing USMCA because that works to Trump's reelection advantage. She cannot bring herself to help US economy and Mexican economy and Canadian economy while harming Chinese economy that all goes to advantage of Trump.

This USMCA is an agreement written between United States and Mexico. Canada sided with Pelosi. Canada's leadership is ideologically aligned with American Democrats and they've decided to wait for the results of the American 2020 election in which they hope to see Trump eliminated. For that reason at this point Canada is merely ancillary. All the real work is between Mexico and the United States.

Pelosi's block is her and Trumka's insistence that Mexico provide Social Security for all of Mexico's workers. Mexico leadership resents Pelosi's interference with Mexican politics. This is ridiculous to the economic agreement.  Mexico's response to  Pelosi is "bite me."

US -- Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer
Mexico -- Foreign Minister Jesus Seade
Canada -- Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland

For all intensive porpoises Chrystia Freeland is irrelevant.

↑ Joke. Okay? Potted plants are never irrelevant. They clean the air and they bring a sense of the outdoors to interiors. They soften hard edges and they provide life to otherwise dead interiors.

USMCA is an agreement between Lighthizer and Seade that Canada joined. 

This meeting is something between Lighthizer and Seade that extends the work within the deal that will put a stop to Pelosi and Trumka's obstructionist claims, something such as  provisions in which Mexico agrees to border enforcement should a labor dispute panel arbitrate a US labor union challenge. Something like a small arbitration trade panel to make quicker labor related trade dispute resolutions rather than enduring extensive court cases.

Trump wouldn't be having Lighthizer call Seade to Washington if he and AMLO had not already worked all this out. 

Mexico to spend $44 billion on infrastructure in first phase of plan https://t.co/1PJOY63AYH pic.twitter.com/b45Ugi64pq

— Reuters (@Reuters) November 26, 2019

This $44 billion investment is why Mexico is willing to assist Trump on border security.

President Trump has leveraged major economic benefit to Mexico because in the larger picture the USMCA, in combination with prior ASEAN agreements, is the economic breech that drains China. However, to receive the benefits, Mexico has to be a stable partner on geopolitical issues including immigration, border security, internal corruption and dealing with drug cartels.

If all this goes according to plan then Trump will have succeeded in replacing China with Mexico for Wall Street US investments.

Trillions of dollars are at stake.

The incentive for Mexico to work with Trump is the US decoupling with China in favor of Mexico. It is a very big deal. It explains Mexican cooperation with Trump.

Canada merely observes. They have already deconstructed their manufacturing base to become a service-driven economy. They watch as Mexico and the United States realign to Central and North American production economies.

Surprise!

USMCA could come up for vote next week.