Mexico's Importance and Multiple Relationships with the United States

Publication Date: January 2006

Publisher: Library of Congress. Congressional Research Service

Author(s):

Research Area: Government

Type:

Coverage: Mexico

Abstract:

This report provides information on the importance of Mexico to U.S. interests and catalogues the many ways Mexico and the United States interact. The report is a snapshot of the bilateral relationship at the beginning of 2006. It will not be updated on a regular basis.

Sharing a 2,000-mile border and extensive interconnections through the Gulf of Mexico, the United States and Mexico are so intricately linked together in an enormous multiplicity of ways that President George W. Bush and other U.S. officials have stated that no country is more important to the United States than Mexico. At the same time, Mexican President Vicente Fox (2000-2006), the first president to be elected from an opposition party in 71 years, has sought to strengthen the relationship with the United States through what some have called a "grand bargain." Under this proposed bargain, the United States would regularize the status of undocumented Mexican workers in the United States and economically assist the less developed partner in the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), while Mexico would be more cooperative in efforts to control the illegal traffic of drugs, people, and goods into the United States.

The southern neighbor is linked with the United States through trade and investment, migration and tourism, environment and health concerns, and family and cultural relationships. It is the second most important trading partner of the United States, and this trade is critical to many U.S. industries and border communities. It is a major source of undocumented migrants and illicit drugs and a possible avenue for the entry of terrorists into the United States. As a result, cooperation with Mexico is essential to deal effectively with migration, drug trafficking, and border, terrorism, health, environment, and energy issues.

The United States and Mexico have developed a wide variety of mechanisms for consultation and cooperation on the range of issues in which the countries interact. These include (1) periodical presidential meetings; (2) annual cabinet-level Binational Commission meetings with 10 Working Groups on major issues; (3) annual meetings of congressional delegations in the Mexico-United States Interparliamentary Group Conferences; (4) NAFTA-related trilateral trade meetings under various groups; (5) regular meetings of the Attorneys General and the Senior Law Enforcement Plenary to deal with law enforcement and counter-narcotics matters; (6) a wide variety of bilateral border area cooperation meetings dealing with environment, health, transportation, and border crossing issues; and (7) trilateral meetings under the "Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP) of North America" launched in Waco, Texas, in March 2005.