According to CNBC, Ford Motor CEO Jim Farley is urging the U.S. government to revise the United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement (USMCA) to impose trade penalties on automakers that rely heavily on vehicle imports — specifically citing Toyota Motor and General Motors, which together imported more than 2.36 million vehicles into the U.S. in 2025.
Level playing field demand amid USMCA renegotiation
As formal negotiations to update the USMCA reopen, Jim Farley, CEO of Ford Motor, stated that current trade rules unfairly advantage manufacturers importing vehicles from Japan and South Korea. He emphasized that automakers producing domestically should receive preferential treatment under any revised agreement. The Trump administration has opted not to renew the trilateral pact outright but instead instituted annual reviews — a process that could terminate the agreement by 2036.
Ford assembled over 2 million vehicles in the U.S. in 2025 — more than any other automaker — including 311,000 units exported to more than 60 international markets. In contrast, the company imported just 378,000 vehicles, representing only 17% of its total 2.2 million U.S. sales last year.
Import volumes spotlight competitive imbalance
Industry data cited in the report shows that General Motors imported 1.17 million vehicles in 2025 — 41% of its U.S. sales — while Toyota Motor imported more than 1.19 million units, or 47% of its domestic sales. Hyundai Motor, the largest importer of vehicles from South Korea, plans to increase its U.S.-produced share of domestic sales to 80% by 2030.
The auto sector accounted for approximately 18% of U.S. trade with Canada and Mexico last year, making it one of the most consequential industries in USMCA discussions. Automakers fear renewed uncertainty could dampen investment and job creation across North America’s integrated supply chain.
Industry coalition urges USMCA continuity
A broad consortium of U.S. trade groups representing automakers, dealers, and suppliers issued a joint statement Wednesday calling for swift extension of the existing USMCA framework. They stressed the need to preserve trilateral cooperation, restore preferential treatment for qualifying goods, and maintain regulatory stability.
“We urge the leaders of the U.S., Canada, and Mexico to swiftly reach consensus on an extension of USMCA that preserves the existing trilateral partnership, returns to preferential treatment for qualifying goods, and continues the stability and predictability that has helped the industry thrive for the past six years.”
The statement reflects widespread concern among industry stakeholders about potential disruptions to cross-border production networks — particularly given the deep integration of engine plants, stamping facilities, and battery component suppliers across all three countries.
Union labor and domestic production as strategic differentiators
Jim Farley highlighted Ford’s alignment with U.S. industrial policy goals: the company employs the highest number of UAW workers among automakers and maintains the strongest ratio of domestic assembly to imports. He underscored this distinction during a phone interview with CNBC on Wednesday, July 1, 2026, ahead of the official reopening of talks.
“Ford’s a leader of U.S. auto production with the most U.S.-built vehicles but, more importantly, we import very few, and we export the most, and we have the most UAW workers here,” Jim Farley said. “So we’re very proud, especially of the ratio between what we build here and what we import.”
This positioning directly supports arguments for tariff-based incentives favoring high-domestic-content manufacturers — a policy lever increasingly debated in Washington as Congress considers updates to Section 301 and USMCA enforcement mechanisms.
Source: CNBC
Compiled from international media by the SCI.AI editorial team.
