MIAMI — A trade agreement that governs nearly $2 trillion in annual commerce is now under formal review—and the outcome will shape North American economies, supply chains, and communities like Miami’s for decades.
The United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement, known as the USMCA, covers a market of more than 500 million people and accounts for roughly 30% of global GDP. In 2024, goods and services trade within North America totaled an estimated $1.93 trillion, with Mexico and Canada standing as the United States’ top two trading partners. Now, for the first time since the agreement replaced NAFTA in 2020, all three countries are sitting down to decide what happens next.
What is the USMCA Review and Why Does it Matter Now?
The USMCA was built with a mandatory six-year checkpoint. By July 1, 2026, the United States, Mexico, and Canada must agree to extend the USMCA for 16 years as-is, approve a revised agreement, or trigger a ten-year annual review countdown that would end with the agreement expiring in 2036.
That deadline is not a formality. U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer of the Trump administration has already told both the House Ways and Means Committee and the Senate Finance Committee that he is not prepared to recommend renewal of the USMCA without changes, saying the agreement’s shortcomings are such that a rubber stamp is not in the national interest.
Formal talks kicked off this month. Greer and his Mexican counterpart, Secretary of Economy Marcelo Ebrard, announced the first round of bilateral discussions in preparation for the joint review, with negotiators directed to begin scoping discussions on ensuring the benefits of the agreement accrue primarily to member nations, reducing dependence on imports from outside the region, strengthening rules of origin, and enhancing the security of North American supply chains.
Canada is simultaneously pursuing its own track. Prime Minister Mark Carney is negotiating a reduction or elimination of tariffs by addressing security and defense irritants, while Canadian officials are also in discussions about softwood lumber quotas with their American counterparts.
What Washington Wants
The Trump administration is using this review as a lever for demands that go well beyond trade. The Trump administration is poised to seek additional concessions from Mexico and Canada on long-standing trade disputes while leveraging the review to address non-trade issues such as migration, drug trafficking, and strategic regional security.
A central concern for the U.S. is China. Washington has grown increasingly wary of Chinese goods entering the American market through Mexico—a practice known as transshipment—and wants its North American partners to align more closely with U.S. policy toward Beijing. Mexico has responded by significantly raising its own tariffs on non-free trade agreement partners, including China, approving additional measures in December 2025 that took effect at the start of 2026—increasing tariffs by around 35% on auto parts, textiles, clothing, plastics, and steel, and 50% on automobiles from non-USMCA countries.
What Mexico and Canada Want
Neither Mexico nor Canada wants a full renegotiation of the agreement’s core structure. Mexico’s business community, drawing on consultations across all 32 states and 573 companies and associations, has called for the 2026 review to modernize the agreement rather than reopen its core chapters. An overwhelming 84% of Mexico’s business sector rates USMCA as positive.
For Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, the first question is whether USMCA will survive at all. If it does, the next questions center on what kind of agreement it will be after 2026 and how much friction national economies and private firms will have to absorb along the way.
Mexico and Canada are also coordinating directly with each other. Economy Minister Marcelo Ebrard and Canada’s Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs Dominic LeBlanc announced a joint action plan to be presented to their respective leaders in the first half of 2026, centered on strengthening bilateral economic ties within the $2 trillion North American trade corridor.
What’s at Stake for Miami
For Miami, the stakes in these negotiations are concrete and personal. The city is the commercial gateway between the United States and Latin America, and its business community has direct exposure to whatever comes out of these talks.
Latin America and the Caribbean are the primary destinations for exports from the Miami Customs District. Mexico has emerged as a standout growth market, with exports from Miami to Mexico up 21% in recent years, making it one of the district’s fastest-growing trade relationships.
Miami’s large Mexican, Colombian, and broader Latin American business diaspora has additional skin in the game. If USMCA negotiations result in higher tariffs, tighter rules of origin, or disrupted supply chains, those effects ripple directly into the import-export businesses, logistics firms, and manufacturing supply relationships that employ tens of thousands of people in South Florida.
According to the Baker Institute, 14 million jobs across North America depend on trade between the United States, Mexico, and Canada—with manufacturing, transportation, insurance services, and other sectors all intertwined in a deeply integrated regional economy.
Three Possible Outcomes
Analysts currently see the review breaking in one of three directions.
The first is a straightforward renewal with targeted updates—the most business-friendly outcome. All three countries agree to extend the agreement through 2042 with modernizing tweaks on digital trade, supply chain rules, and labor standards, without reopening the core framework.
The second is a deeper renegotiation. USMCA is likely to be extended with stricter rules of origin and higher labor requirements that could make North American supply chains less competitive in the short term, though Canada and Mexico would maintain a competitive edge that drives investment over the long term.
The third and least likely outcome is a breakdown—no consensus, triggering annual reviews and the kind of prolonged uncertainty that freezes investment and disrupts supply chains across the continent.
Markets dislike uncertainty, and stability in North American trade dynamics allows the normal flow of capital investment, currency hedging, and the development of more efficient supply chains. Consumers ultimately benefit too—when businesses that rely on cross-border commerce have predictable rules, the flow of goods becomes more affordable, particularly for food and consumer products.
What to Watch in the Coming Months
The formal joint review is set to launch July 1, 2026. Between now and then, the bilateral talks that began this month between the U.S. and Mexico will set the tone. Watch for movement on three specific pressure points: how Washington handles the China transshipment question, whether Mexico’s judicial and energy reforms become bargaining chips in the talks, and whether Canada can secure relief from steel and aluminum tariffs as part of a broader deal.
For Miami’s business community and Latin American diaspora, the USMCA review is not a distant policy debate. It is a negotiation over the rules that govern how goods move, how jobs are created, and how deeply the economies of the United States and Latin America remain connected.
Sociedad Media will update this article as talks develop.
Sociedad Media will continue to monitor USMCA negotiations as they progress toward the July 1 deadline. Are you a Miami business owner, trade professional, or community member with a stake in these talks? Reach out to our team at info@sociedadmedia.com—we want to hear from you.
