Fain, UAW issue trade 'demands' ahead of US-Mexico talks next week
WASHINGTON - The United Auto Workers union on Thursday laid out its "demands" to the Trump administration ahead of trade negotiations between the United States and Mexico on May 25.
The talks will be part of a previously scheduled formal review of the United States-Canada-Mexico agreement, commonly known as USMCA. President Donald Trump signed the trade deal during his first term to replace its oft-maligned predecessor, the North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA.
"Next week, talks are going to kick off in some of the most important negotiations for the working class in years," UAW President Shawn Fain told reporters in a web briefing. "It's an existential issue for our membership and for the entire working class, not just in auto, but in several sectors of our union."
While Fain and other leaders in the Detroit-based union have opposed Trump on most fronts, they have generally supported the Republican president's position on tariffs as a way to coerce businesses into making more manufacturing investments in the United States. Union officials did not mention Trump by name Thursday, but they did describe three main goals they hope negotiators pursue in reviewing the USMCA - which Fain described as "broken."
The goals included a "build here to sell here" policy that pushes automakers to produce as many vehicles domestically as they sell; "real labor rights" that give workers a reliable and fast mechanism for adjudicating labor rights abuses across the continent; and "strong standards across borders" on issues like worker pay, health and safety, and industrial strategy.
Currently, the UAW noted, the United States produces 61 vehicles for every 100 sold domestically, whereas Mexico's ratio is 249 to 100.
Despite celebrating and signing the USMCA deal in 2020, Trump has since distanced himself from the agreement. "There's no real advantage to it. It's irrelevant," he said in January.
Trump originally sought the USMCA deal after routinely railing against NAFTA in his successful 2016 presidential bid, arguing the prior accord caused the loss of millions of American manufacturing and auto jobs.
His USMCA agreement was meant to reverse the decline of U.S. manufacturing jobs by requiring companies to meet regional value and labor content rules as a precondition for duty-free import privileges throughout North America. Six years later, both he and the UAW want more from the deal.
Trump has already expressed his dissatisfaction with Canada and Mexico since returning to office in 2025 by imposing or raising import taxes on autos, steel, aluminum and other goods from the United States' northern and southern neighbors.
The U.S. tariff rate on automotive goods from both countries is now 25%, though there are partial exemptions and rebates available based on USMCA compliance, U.S. content levels of imported items and U.S. assembly.
Average duty charges were consistently close to 0.5% on automotive goods from Mexico and Canada before Trump's second term, according to a Detroit News analysis of U.S. trade data.
Those rates have hovered close to 10% since the rollout of new automotive tariffs last April. In absolute terms, duty charges on auto goods entering the United States from Canada and Mexico have cost businesses about $20 billion.
The USMCA nominally requires the three countries to decide by July 1 whether they will recommit to the deal, but that deadline is not firm.
The trilateral trade agreement does not end if the parties fail to reach an extension during the 2026 mandatory review. The deal, as written, stays in place until 2036. For it to end sooner, one of the countries would need to actively leave the accord.
Canada is not scheduled to attend the May 25 talks in Mexico City as Prime Minister Mark Carney and Trump remain at an impasse over the U.S. president's tariff actions.
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This story was originally published May 22, 2026 at 10:36 AM.