Around the world, from Ukraine to the Taiwan Strait, democracies are under threat.  It is easy, therefore, to take for granted the stability, strength, and durability of North American democracies.  For 200 years, despite bumps and bruises, populism and partisanship, democracy has endured in the United States, Mexico, and Canada.  Over the last decade, that democratic stability has evolved into deep and powerful economic integration – fostering growth throughout the trade bloc while improving our mutual economic security.  In an era when adversarial authoritarian regimes, like China and Russia, increasing seek to use economic coercion to diminish the national security of democracies, it is essential that we lean into that economic strength and security more than ever.

Under NAFTA and its successor, the USMCA, North America has created the world’s strongest democratic trading bloc and, in the process, moved Mexico and Canada ahead of China as the U.S.’s leading trading partner – a welcome development.  Together, the United States, Mexico, and Canada conduct $1.5 trillion in annual bilateral trade, accounting for more than a quarter of America’s imports and exports.  With the USMCA up for review in 2026, all three countries should be taking steps now to make sure that the process goes smoothly, removing obstacles and building the institutional business and government architecture to move the North American integration from politically delicate to economically unassailable.

With a new government taking office in Mexico in October and a new administration being elected in the United States in November, there is an opportunity to move away from old dynamics and tensions and reinvigorate broad cooperation on both sides of the border and with Canada.  The list of issues to address is long, but critically important: Chinese overcapacity and dumping; transnational crime and fentanyl trafficking; opacity and shell companies that shield adversarial and illegal activity; and insufficient attention to corruption, sanctions evasion, and money laundering. The future of the trading bloc and the security of our democracies will depend on how we meet these challenges.

Perhaps most important, North America needs to develop consensus on the threats posed by authoritarian regimes, like China, who are increasing their influence, their economic engagement, and their intelligence gathering throughout the region.  It is essential that Mexico, the U.S. and Canada present a united front on Chinese economic pressures – the dumping of cheap goods that undermine local manufacturing, IP theft, sanctions evasion, the facilitation of rogue regimes, and risks from Chinese monopolization of key sectors like critical minerals, communications, infrastructure, and essential manufacturing. North America’s vibrant open market system is vulnerable Chinese pricing manipulation and suppression of domestic industries, something that all three economies should be motivated to address.  The national and economic security concerns deriving from China’s surveillance apparatus (and aspirations) must also be meaningfully addressed by all three countries, each of which has been employing an ad hoc whack-a-mole strategy against prominent companies like Huawei or TikTok, while leaving enormous vulnerabilities intact.

North America is already economically co-dependent and interconnected in valuable ways that improve the stability and economic security of all three nations – something that is particularly important in today’s unpredictable geopolitical environment. Mexico is a hub for complex co-production efforts in key industries like automotive, pharmaceuticals, and defense. Mexico’s potential as a reliable ally-shoring destination for critical supply chains that are looking to avoid or move out of adversarial countries, like China, cannot be overstated.

Indeed, the global rewiring of critical supply chains in the wake of Covid-era vulnerabilities, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and the Chinese Communist Party’s move toward economic coercion presents Mexico, and President-elect Sheinbaum with a once in a lifetime opportunity to supercharge its role as a key manufacturing hub – capturing growth and prosperity that could catapult Mexican industry up the value chain, while simultaneously helping to lower immigration pressures at the U.S. Southern border.

An economically stronger Mexico also benefits the U.S. – economically, in terms of cheaper products, lower inflation, and manufacturing synergies, but also from a national security perspective. As much as Americans fret about migrants at the southern border, we tend to forget that, to some extent, Mexico has become the border. Since Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas traveled to Mexico City in December 2023 to meet with President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, the Mexican government has drastically increased its migrant apprehensions. Prior to the meeting, Mexico apprehended nearly 100,000 migrants per month. Starting in January 2024, Mexico began apprehending almost 125,000 per month. This has sent America’s Southwest land border encounters plummeting from a peak of roughly 300,000 in December 2023 to 130,000 by June 2024.

Enhanced cooperation between the U.S. and Mexico on immigration, border technology, cartel violence, and drug trafficking will improve our mutual national security even further and stabilize the conditions that drive excess migration.  Building an aggressive joint strategy on fentanyl is particularly important, striking against the money laundering and Chinese precursor chemical that support the trade and cost American lives. Failing to address these issues now will throw a wrench in the review of the USMCA in 2026.

Our democratic security will also improve if we contribute to tools to strengthen the economic integration of the alliance. For instance, the trade bloc would be well advised to implement a next generation of “trusted trader” programs – where key suppliers could open themselves and their shipments up with full transparency to customs and law enforcement in exchange for expedited treatment at the border, dedicated points of entry and lanes over bridges, and streamlined bureaucracy. Investing more in border facilitation technology and security for commerce will also advance the secure border required to deal with immigration challenges. Strengthening rules of origin rules and developing consistent Most Favored Nation tariff rates could also be addressed now without waiting for USMCA review.  North America could also better leverage existing capacities under the USMCA, such as developing stand-alone customs unions to promote integration in particularly critical sectors.

Democracy and strong economic conditions are mutually reinforcing.  One of the most important ways to protect democracy in North America and roll back authoritarian coercion is to bolster an economic alliance that supports the rules-based order by which the private sector and democratic institutions flourish.  The USCMA and deep economic integration is the key to that. Simply put, the U.S. will be more effective in countering threats to democracy through an alignment with our North American trade partners.

The USMCA has brought massive economic benefits to North America.  It is also a template for greater integration and economic security for decades to come.  North America is strong – but now is the time to make it stronger.

*Elaine Dezenski is Senior Director and Head of the Center on Economic and Financial Power at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, an independent, non-partisan foreign policy think tank. She previously served as Deputy and Acting Assistant Secretary for Policy at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.