Decision Point Nears for USMCA Review

The clock is ticking ahead of a July 1 deadline for a decision on USMCA. (Debra Devine/ Transport Topics and Getty Images)

In boardrooms from Montreal to Laredo, Texas, motor carriers are gaming out multiple futures for the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement and the potential implications for cross-border freight ahead of a July 1 negotiation deadline.

Six years after USMCA replaced the North American Free Trade Agreement and ushered in a period of growth and relative predictability for cross-border freight, the trade pact has entered its first mandatory review cycle. While trucks continue to roll across the continent, carriers say the lack of clarity around what comes next is already shaping behavior, from equipment deployment to network expansion, even before negotiators sit down in earnest.

When USMCA was crafted in 2020, it was designed to address President Donald Trump’s reshoring priorities while preserving the free flow of goods across North America. The agreement helped boost U.S. manufacturing, accelerated Mexican industrial growth and underpinned what has become one of the world’s largest integrated trucking markets, industry observers say.

Now, as the July 1 review milestone approaches, fleets are watching less for disruption than for signals. They want any indication of whether the pact will be renewed, amended or allowed to drift into a period of annual uncertainty.

The issue for trucking is not whether cross-border freight will suddenly stop. It is whether prolonged ambiguity around USMCA’s future could chill investment, slow capacity decisions and inject volatility into a freight market already struggling to regain momentum after tariff shocks earlier in the decade.

Most industry watchers expect changes to the agreement and believe a deal will ultimately be struck, even if negotiations stretch beyond July 1. But until that happens, carriers say the countdown itself is shaping the market.

The July 1 date marks the time when the three countries must decide whether to extend the agreement for another 16 years or allow it to enter a cycle of annual reviews.

“It’s not a deadline for completing negotiations,” Center for Strategic and International Studies fellow Diego Marroquin Bitar and senior adviser William Alan Reinsch wrote in a recent analysis. Rather, both contend, it is the moment when the clock either resets or starts running down.

The first bilateral round of USMCA review negotiations between the United States and Mexico is scheduled for the week of May 25 in Mexico City. Preliminary bilateral discussions began March 16 between U.S. and Mexican trade officials.

Canada has not yet been formally involved as Ottawa recalibrates its global posture after recent comments by Trump suggesting the country should become the United States’ 51st state.

Trade Uncertainty

Getting clarity on the pact’s future has moved to the forefront for many fleets with exposure to cross-border freight.

U.S. imports of goods totaled a record $3.4 trillion in 2025, according to Census Bureau data, with Mexico and Canada ranking as the top two trade partners.

In the past year, carriers such as R+L Carriers, Southeastern Freight Lines and A. Duie Pyle have expanded their cross-border operations. R+L Carriers ranks No. 15 on the Transport Topics Top 100 list of the largest for-hire carriers in North America, while SEFL ranks No. 24 and Pyle ranks No. 56.

Canadian trucking conglomerate TFI International, which ranks No. 4 on that list, has declined to issue full-year 2026 guidance until the trade picture becomes clearer.

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Bédard

“It’s too unstable right now until we have that,” Chairman, President and CEO Alain Bédard told analysts during the Montreal-based carrier’s April 27 first-quarter 2026 earnings call.

“Hopefully we’ll have that by the end of the summer,” added Bédard, who has previously criticized the unpredictability of Trump administration trade policy and its impact on TFI’s flatbed operations.

Those operations, which haul steel, aluminum and lumber across the U.S.-Canada border, were heavily disrupted by Section 232 tariffs.

The uncertainty surrounding tariffs played a role in delaying the freight market rebound many carriers had expected at the start of 2025.

But a different trade policy matter is now front and center in executives’ minds — USMCA.

Potential Outcomes

USMCA became effective July 1, 2020. Under Article 34.7 of the treaty, the three governments must decide by July 1 whether to extend it for a further 16 years.

Should any party decline to do so, USMCA begins a cycle of annual reviews. If no resolution is found, the treaty will expire. If USMCA is renewed, with or without amendments, the same process will recur in 2032.

In short, the six options for the three nations are: renewal, extension with concessions, serial annual reviews, expiration in 2036, reversion to bilateral deals and early withdrawal via Article 34.6.

Option No. 2 is the oddsmakers’ favorite. That’s because USMCA has been successful.

“From a trucking perspective, but also I think from a U.S. economy perspective, USMCA has been a huge success,” Bob Costello, chief economist and senior vice president at American Trucking Associations, told TT in a mid-April interview.

Like most other industry observers, Costello anticipates that the USMCA countries will pursue an extension with concessions.

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Tractor trailers wait for inspection at the Bridge of the Americas International Bridge port of entry, on the U.S.-Mexico border in Juarez, Chihuahua. (Justin Hamel/Bloomberg News)

“There is ample evidence of plants opening up in North America, nearshoring, reshoring and onshoring,” Costello told TT. “All the permutations are there with USMCA. And with that, we saw, especially with Mexico, some nice gains in truck-transported freight.”

Mexico also views the treaty favorably, said Gregorio Canales, office managing partner at Mexico-based law firm Dentons López Velarde.

“I think it has been one of the most consequential treaties that Mexico has entered,” said Canales, who previously served as minister for legal affairs at Mexico’s U.S. Embassy during the original NAFTA negotiations.

Canales said the Sheinbaum administration is expected to seek closer economic alignment with the United States during the talks, even as broader political uncertainty clouds the process.

For now, the uncertainty has not translated into operational disruption at the border.

“In the next couple of weeks, we expect the market to watch closely for signals around rules of origin, supply chain security and efforts to reduce reliance on non-North American inputs,” said Miguel Hernandez, terminal manager at Bennett Motor Express, adding those areas have emerged as focal points in early U.S.-Mexico discussions.

“Cross-border freight does not stop because negotiations begin,” he said. “But uncertainty can influence shipping patterns, sourcing conversations and compliance planning before any formal policy changes are made.”

Hernandez is based in Laredo, Texas, the nation’s busiest land port, which handles about 40% of all inbound truck traffic from Mexico, according to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics.

Bennett Motor Express is part of Bennett Family of Cos., which ranks No. 36 on the for-hire TT100.

Traffic is also rising at crossings in Tijuana, McAllen, Brownsville and El Paso, said Troy Ryley, president of Echo Global Logistics’ Mexican operations.

“There’s a lot of instability in the market today, especially for carriers,” Ryley said. “Quick changes in freight flows could knock players out of the market and put additional stress on equipment availability.”

Echo ranks No. 19 on TT’s Top 100 list of the largest logistics companies in North America and No. 6 among freight brokers.

Uber Freight Senior Vice President of Sales Zeid Houssami said carriers see two possible paths.

“The first is certainty. A deal is struck and the partners lock arms,” Houssami said. “The alternative is less desirable. One or more countries push to renegotiate, and the USMCA effectively rolls over on an annual basis.”

That outcome, he said, would prolong uncertainty in a market already sensitive to policy signals. Uber Freight ranks No. 16 on the logistics TT100 and No. 11 among freight brokers.

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Greer

One of the central figures in the talks will be U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, who told attendees at an April 7 Hudson Institute event that stakeholder feedback revealed both broad support for the pact and widespread calls for change.

“Almost everyone suggested changes to the agreement,” Greer said. “There were a lot of stakeholders that suggested it hadn’t gone far enough away from NAFTA.”

Greer acknowledged Trump’s dissatisfaction with some USMCA outcomes but said he remains optimistic a deal can be reached, even if negotiations extend beyond July 1.

Canales shares that optimism, noting that a revamped USMCA would be politically valuable for the Trump administration ahead of November’s midterm elections and economically critical for Mexico.

Beyond seeking certainty, trucking groups are pushing for tangible improvements. Costello said ATA is advocating for increased investment at ports of entry, including expanded use of nonintrusive inspection technologies, to improve security and throughput.

“I think both are achievable,” he said.