Mexico Going All Out for Approval of Free-Trade Pact

MEXICO CITY — Once the most reluctant of lobbyists, Mexico is making a major pitch not only on Capitol Hill, but across the United States for the proposed North American free-trade agreement.

Besides the $100 million the government has budgeted to hire well-known public relations and policy-oriented law firms, prominent executives and officials from the president down are stumping the United States to drum up support.

Mexico has also hosted trips for congressional aides, signed well-publicized agreements and organized press briefings on both sides of the border to counteract environmental and labor concerns, the major objections raised by opponents of the agreement.

“This is a 180-degree turnaround, an extremely important change,” said Lorenzo Meyer, an expert on U.S.-Mexico relations at El Colegio de Mexico, a research university here.

Today’s votes in the Senate Finance and House Ways and Means committees on “fast track” negotiating authority for President Bush are a critical step toward an agreement that would eliminate barriers to trade with Mexico. Eventual passage of a free-trade agreement could be a watershed for Mexico’s approach to diplomatic, as well as economic, relations with the United States.

If that happens, Mexico will have a strong voice in U.S. policy-making for the first time since the Civil War era, when Mexican Ambassador Matias Romero tried to oust both Abraham Lincoln and his secretary of state, and then played an active role in Andrew Johnson’s impeachment.

While Romero has been revered by generations of Mexican diplomats as his country’s most effective ambassador, his successors have been forbidden to follow his example. During most of this century, Mexico has shrunk from pushing its views on U.S. legislation for fear the United States would actively lobby its government.

The Mexican government’s willingness to break such a strong foreign policy taboo reflects how crucial the proposed free-trade agreement is to the Carlos Salinas de Gortari Administration’s economic policy.

“In the last couple years there has been a remarkable change in the efforts by Mexico to present its perspective not only to the (President) and Congress, but also to the media and opinion makers,” said Abraham Lowenthal, director of USC’s California-Mexico Project. “I am struck by how much intelligent effort is going into that.”

The Salinas Administration has improved government relations with business to the point that the public and private sectors have been able to work together on the free-trade effort.

Prominent Mexican business executives are spending 90% of their time meeting with U.S. politicians, business groups and Latino organizations, talking about free trade.

“There are some things you have to do yourself,” said Juan Gallardo, president of a major Coca-Cola bottler and the business community’s point man on the free-trade negotiations. “This is an event of enormous consequence to the country. It requires the highest level of involvement.”

Mexican senators, deputies and governors also have been called on to play a role. For example, it was Mexican governors--with help from the U.S. and Mexican commerce secretaries--who persuaded California Gov. Pete Wilson to support fast-track authority during a border governors’ meeting early this year.

Victoria Clarke, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Trade Representative’s office and a supporter of free trade, believes that the efforts have gone a long way toward changing the stereotypical views that led to Mexico-bashing on everything from pollution to illegal drugs during the 1980s.

One Congressional aide who has been closely involved in the issue was less convinced of the effectiveness of the effort: “Clearly, the government of Mexico has retained a fair number of costly and high-powered lobbyists who are tripping all over each other.”

But the money does not matter, Meyer said. “Considering the importance that this agreement has for Mexico, $100 million is peanuts,” he said.

Times staff writer Karen Tumulty in Washington contributed to this story.