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Guest Commentary: July 27, 2001
U.S. Within Rights to Impose Trucking Safety Standards
The Honorable Max Baucus
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The last Administration delayed opening the border to Mexican trucks because of serious safety concerns.
Indeed, numerous reports have documented these concerns -- failing brakes, overweight trucks, and uninsured, unlicensed drivers -- to name just a few.
The most recent figures of the Department of Transportation indicate that Mexican trucks are much more likely to be ordered off the road for severe safety deficiencies than either U.S. or Canadian trucks.
While a NAFTA arbitration panel has ruled that the United States must initiate efforts to open the border to these trucks, we need to be clear about what the panel has said.
The panel indicated:
The United States may not be required to treat applications from Mexican trucking firms in exactly the same manner as applications from United States or Canadian firms. ..... U.S. authorities are responsible for the safe operations of trucks within U.S. territory, whether ownership is United States, Canadian, or Mexican.
Moreover, the panel also indicated that U.S. compliance with its NAFTA obligations "would not necessarily require providing favorable consideration to all or to any specific number of applications" for Mexican trucks so long as these applications are reviewed, "on a case-by-case basis."
In other words, the U.S. government is well within its rights to impose standards it considers necessary to ensure that our highways are safe.
The [Bush] Administration has suggested that it is seeking to treat U.S., Mexican, and Canadian trucks in the same way -- but we are not required to treat them in the same way. That's what the NAFTA panel said.
With Mexican trucks, there are greater safety risks. And where there are greater safety risks, we can -- and must -- impose stricter safety standards.
Note: This column has been adapted from a speech Sen. Baucus delivered on the floor of the Senate, July 26, 2001.
 How to contact Senator Max Baucus (D-MT)
Reading a past guest commentary? Click here for the most current one.
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