Bush Wants U.S. Roads Opened to Mexican Trucks, Buses

Mexican trucks and buses soon may be rolling throughout California and the Southwestern states, with the backing of President Bush and the Supreme Court.

Bush administration lawyers on Wednesday urged the high court to lift a court order barring Mexican trucks from going beyond a 20-mile border zone, and none of the justices took sharp exception during the hourlong argument.

If the high court indeed sides with the administration, it could clear the way for thousands of Mexican trucks to deliver goods within the United States.

That prospect -- one that worries environmentalists, safety advocates and American truckers -- has loomed since 2001, when the president announced plans to lift a long-standing ban on Mexican trucks in order to comply with the North American Free Trade Agreement, which seeks to create a free-trade zone between Canada, Mexico and the U.S.

“I believe strongly we can have safety on our highways without discriminating against our neighbors to the south,” Bush said in August 2001 in Albuquerque. “We ought to accept the spirit of NAFTA.”

The issue, which has been argued for nearly a decade, has aligned protectionist groups with health and safety organizations in a coalition that has so far succeeded in blocking the entry of the Mexican trucks, which coalition members say could number 34,000.

An international arbitration panel ruled in 2001 that the United States must abandon its barriers “with respect to cross-border trucking services” and passenger buses, and Bush said he intended to comply with that demand.

But before he could do so, opponents sued to block the action. They include the American Lung Assn., the American Public Health Assn., the City of Los Angeles, the South Coast Air Quality Management District, Democratic California Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer and Republican Reps. Mary Bono of Palm Springs and Elton Gallegly of Simi Valley.

Previous opposition to the Mexican trucks had been based on safety concerns, because many of the vehicles didn’t meet U.S. safety standards. But the lawsuit before the high court focuses on the environmental effect.

The opponents said the older, diesel-burning trucks and buses in use in Mexico would belch dirty air and add to the already severe pollution problems in California, Texas and throughout the Southwest.

They won a victory before the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, which blocked Bush from proceeding. Its judges posed the issue as a clash between the international treaty and U.S. environmental standards.

They said the U.S. Department of Transportation, which enforces safety standards, had failed to conduct an environmental impact study on the likely effect of the Mexican trucks.

“Although we agree with the importance of the United States’ compliance with its treaty obligations with its southern neighbor, Mexico, such compliance cannot come at the cost of violating U.S. law,” wrote Judge Kim M. Wardlaw for the 9th Circuit.

But the Bush administration lawyers called that ruling flatly wrong during Wednesday’s argument. The Transportation Department enforces safety rules, not antipollution standards, they said.

The agency’s officials “have no authority to deny [admission of Mexican trucks] based on environmental concerns,” argued Edwin Kneedler, a deputy U.S. solicitor general. Beyond that, the president has the power to enforce treaties without seeking permission of the agencies, he added.

“It’s essentially a political decision” entrusted to the president, Kneedler argued.

The justices seemed to agree. “It seems to me a very doubtful proposition” that the regulations governing the Transportation Department would stop the president from enforcing the treaty, Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist commented.

Under the free-trade treaty, “Mexicans and Americans are to be treated alike,” said Justice Stephen G. Breyer. He too wondered how safety regulations in U.S. law gave the appeals court reason to block the flow of Mexican trucks.

Currently, Mexican trucks cross the border about 4.5 million times a year, the government said in its brief to the court. Under the current rules, those trucks must unload their shipments so they can be transferred to U.S. trucks.

The Mexican trucking industry has also voiced opposition to the free movement of trucks across the border, because it would mean U.S. trucks would be able to travel freely in Mexico. Mexican truckers also don’t believe they can compete with their more modern American counterparts.

However, Mexican officials and some U.S. businesses say this ban on the free flow of Mexican trucks and buses results in billions of dollars in economic losses each year, and they have pressed the administration to lift the restriction.

The high court will rule on the issue by late June. The case is U.S. Department of Transportation vs. Public Citizen.