After six years spent hauling Hyundai auto parts from Baja California to Alabama, Jesus Iturbero wanted a raise and better working conditions for himself and his fellow Mexican camioneros. But when he tried in 2021 to organize an independent labor union, he told me he was fired from his job at a cross-border trucking company.
Out of work, he continued his union organizing efforts but “we were getting nowhere,” Iturbero said last week. He’s now the secretary general of the Supply Chain Transporters Union (SITRABICS), which advocates for a highly specialized group of Mexican workers: long-haul truckers who carry goods between Mexico and the U.S. interior.
In June, SITRABICS joined forces with a Washington, D.C.-based research and advocacy nonprofit – Rethink Trade at the American Economic Liberties Project – to file a labor complaint through the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), a trilateral trade treaty signed in 2020.