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May 17, 2000

AUSTIN, MAY 16 (AP) - Shortly after he was elected governor, George W. Bush attended the inauguration of Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo. Friendship blossomed as the Texan promoted free trade and close ties.

 

Now Bush, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, cites his relationship with Mexico as one of his foreign policy credentials and extolls the benefits of the North American Free Trade Agreement despite critics' arguments that the pact hurts U.S. workers.

  

"NAFTA is good for Texas, it is good for Mexico, and it is important for our citizens to understand it is good for America," Bush says. With Texas accounting for nearly half the U.S. exports to Mexico, he says, "I have seen firsthand the benefits of trade and free trade."

  

As a presidential candidate, he is taking his views further, favoring permanent normal trade relations with China and admitting China and Taiwan into the World Trade Organization. There, too, organized labor contends that granting China permanent normal trade status would pull jobs from the United States. A House of Representatives vote on China trade is set for this month.

  

Vice President Al Gore, Bush's Democratic presidential rival, also favors China's entry into the WTO, ors.

  

Most of George W. Bush's trade background relates to Mexico, which shares a 1,200-mile (1.930-kilometer) border with Texas. Ties with Mexico have been a priority since he was elected governor in 1994.

  

When some Republicans would speak against Mexican immigrants, Bush would refuse to take part, said Jorge Gonzalez, chairman of the economics department at Trinity University in San Antonio. Instead, Bush built relationships with Mexico's leaders and touted free trade as a way to create economic opportunities on both sides of the border.

  

"I think this has paid off very well for the state of Texas," Gonzalez said.

  

Trade between the United States and Mexico now totals about dlrs 200 billion annually, and Texas accounted for almost half the dlrs 87 billion in U.S. exports to Mexico last year, according to the Texas Department of Economic Development. 

   

Electronic equipment comprises the largest portion, followed by transportation equipment, industrial machinery, chemicals and rubber and plastics.

  

Since NAFTA's passage in 1993, Texas has accounted for one of every 10 new jobs added to the U.S. economy, said Bush spokesman Scott McClellan.

  

But not everyone in Texas likes the effect of the trade pact, which the Texas AFL-CIO labor federation says sent thousands of jobs across the border because of lower wages. The labor group cites El Paso as the Texas city suffering the worst, with a loss of 25,000 jobs.

  

Though NAFTA advocates say jobs have been created by the trade pact to offset any losses, organized labor attributes job creation to a strong domestic economy fueled by high technology, said Ed Sills, spokesman for the Texas AFL-CIO.

  

Bush has joined Zedillo in the past year to dedicate two new international bridges on the Texas-Mexico border built to handle increased trade traffic, most recently in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico. Laredo, Texas, the adjoining city on the U.S. side, is the nation's largest inland port with up to 10,000 commercial trucks crossing the border.

  

The Bush campaign has called on the Clinton administration to open access to Mexican commercial  trucks as provided for by NAFTA.

   

Trucks from the United States and Mexico were supposed to be able to travel throughout each other's border states starting in 1995 and throughout each other's country by this year.

  

The Bush campaign and others claim that Clinton administration allegiance to organized labor is the reason truck access has remained limited. The 1.4 million-member Teamsters Union opposes opening the roads.

  

The Gore campaign says safety is the real issue because Mexico's trucks and drivers aren't required to meet the same standards as those in the United States. The administration is continuing to work with Mexico toward opening the roads, a Gore campaign spokesman said.

 

 


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