With a looming trade war between the U.S., Canada and Mexico as a result of President Trump threatening the application of 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico (a move the Wall Street Journal referred to as “the dumbest in history”), I feel a tragic sense of loss, shock and outrage. For me, the 33-year era of North American free trade agreements has been a career spanning trajectory that linked the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)  and its replacement, the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (UCSMCA), with economic well-being, environmental protection and democratization along the U.S.-Mexico border, especially in Mexico.

My firsthand experiences with the positive economic and environmental impacts of North American trade agreements are based on decades living and working on the border and in Mexico. In 1993, I was a lifeguard at the Silver Strand State Beach in Coronado, when beaches in the South Bay were closed as a result of broken sewage plants in Tijuana and El Niño related flooding. To address that early pollution crisis, I organized protests and advocated for new wastewater treatment infrastructure to deal with the situation. . .

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