MEXICO CITY: Gov. Greg Abbott is expected to visit Mexico City on Labor Day weekend, his first trip abroad as governor, and will lead a delegation of Texans eager to move forward amid turbulent times between once-solid neighbors.
The agenda is still being fleshed out for the first trip to Mexico by a Texas governor since 2007, but people familiar with the matter say the visit is aimed at mending fences and underscoring the economic, cultural and political integration between Texas and its southern neighbor, an important trading partner.
Texas and Mexican officials, along with business leaders, will focus on strengthening trade and border security and exploring increased opportunities in the telecommunications, airlines and energy sectors.
Abbott is expected to invite President Enrique Peña Nieto to visit Texas later this year or sometime in 2016, depending on the president’s schedule.
“Governor Abbott looks forward to traveling to Mexico,” said John Wittman, Abbott’s deputy press secretary.
The visit comes as divisive issues raise questions about what many once considered a solid friendship that has become strained. This is in part due to factors within Texas and most recently to a polarizing presidential campaign in which candidates, led by billionaire Donald Trump, are using Mexico as a convenient piñata to make splashy headlines and advance in the polls, analysts say.
“Abbott heads to Mexico as many leaders in his party — and potential presidential candidates — have fallen to Mexico-bashing,” said Shannon K. O’Neil, a Mexico expert at the Council on Foreign Relations and author of Two Nations Indivisible: Mexico, the United States and the Road Ahead. “While this bravado appeals to a vociferous group of Republican voters, it runs counter to Texas’ self-interest, given the importance of Mexico for the state’s economy and well-being.”
Mexico is Texas’ largest export market — buying more than $100 billion of goods a year from Texas companies. Combined, the two sides’ trade is more than $200 billion, double the trade between Mexico and the United Kingdom. The U.S. Commerce Department estimates this trade supports more than 300,000 Texas jobs.
“Mexico-Texas ties go far beyond economic exchanges, as families span the border as well,” O’Neil said.
On Monday, in an unusual move, Mexico filed an amicus curiae brief against Texas in a lawsuit filed by four women whose children have been denied birth certificates by the Texas Department of State Health Services based on the mothers’ legal status in the United States.
The lawsuit, filed in May, includes Mexican, Honduran and Guatemalan plaintiffs represented by Texas Rio Grande Legal Aid. It argues that refusing to issue birth certificates is a violation of the 14th Amendment, which recognizes that children born on U.S. soil are citizens, regardless of whether their parents are citizens.
In the last year, according to the legal aid group and the Mexican government, Texas’ Vital Statistics Unit has denied parents without proper authorization birth certificates for their children. The parents have been told that matriculas consulares — photo ID cards issued by Mexican consulates on U.S. soil — and Mexican passports without a current visa will not be accepted.
The legal team, led by attorney Jennifer Harbury, is seeking a court order to reinstate the use of the matricula consular and foreign passports as valid proof of identity for unauthorized mothers.
The Mexican consul general in Austin, Carlos González Gutiérrez, said withholding birth certificates has “detrimental consequences.” His remarks were made during a regional conference of Hispanic journalists in Austin over the weekend. González said he believes the two sides have a “matured enough” relationship to overcome such matters.
The issue is just one of many that have widened the gap between Texas and Mexico, even as economic ties have grown stronger as a result of the North American Free Trade Agreement.
“States like Texas depend enormously on exports to Mexico to create jobs at home, and increasingly there is a great deal of Mexican investment coming to cities like Dallas and San Antonio to start or expand businesses there,” said Andrew Selee, a Mexico expert at the Washington-based Wilson Center.
“Dozens of big American companies like Borden milk, America’s second-largest milk and dairy provider — which is headquartered in Dallas — are actually owned by Mexicans today. This is also true of the biggest American cement and bread companies.”
O’Neil said, “Abbott needs to find a way to return to and build on benefits of these close ties.”
