U.S.-Mexico Trade Hit $73 Billion in February as Border Capacity Tightens

U.S.-Mexico trade totaled $73.02 billion in February 2026, making Mexico the United States’ top trading partner for the month even as cross-border capacity tightened at major land gateways. The new trade figure, published in early April by the U.S. Census Bureau and highlighted in recent reporting by FreightWaves, points to a corridor that is still expanding in value while the physical border system remains finite.

That matters because the latest pressure is no longer just about one-off disruptions. CAP previously covered the early-April Mexico truckers’ nationwide strike, but the more important follow-on story now is structural: nearshoring-driven demand, rising manufacturing investment, and concentrated flows through a handful of truck and rail gateways are keeping the U.S.-Mexico corridor tight even after the protest headline faded.

The new data point: trade stayed high

The Census Bureau’s monthly trade release for February 2026 showed that U.S. exports and imports continued to run at historically high levels, with February total U.S. exports reaching a record $314.8 billion. Within that, bilateral U.S.-Mexico trade came in at roughly $73 billion, according to Census-based trade tallies cited by FreightWaves.

The broader trend line is also clear. The Bureau of Transportation Statistics reported that U.S.-Mexico freight reached $872.8 billion in 2025, up 3.9% from 2024. Trucking remained dominant, carrying 73.6% of freight by value with Mexico, while rail accounted for 10.9%. In other words, the modal mix itself explains why border fluidity matters so much: most of the value still depends on surface crossings.

The same BTS report said the leading truck ports with Mexico were Laredo, Ysleta, and Otay Mesa, while the top rail connection ports were Laredo, Eagle Pass, and El Paso. That concentration means growth is not spreading evenly across the entire border; it is loading a limited set of high-volume gateways.

What “capacity tightening” means in practice

In operational terms, tightening border capacity does not require a full shutdown to create serious problems. It can show up as:

• fewer usable crossing windows for northbound and southbound moves;
• longer queue times at primary and secondary inspection;
• tighter drayage and tractor availability near the border;
• trailer imbalances between Mexican and U.S. yards;
• reduced flexibility for same-day recovery when a truck misses its slot;
• more exposure to customs-document errors, inspection pulls, or security-related delays.

That pattern is especially acute in gateways already operating near design limits. In Texas, the 2021 Texas-Mexico Border Transportation Master Plan said median commercial crossing times generally stayed under an hour at many crossings, but it also identified worsening delay risk at high-volume bridges such as Pharr-Reynosa. More recently, the environmental review for the Pharr-Reynosa International Bridge expansion stated that short-term operational fixes had largely been exhausted and that rising commercial volumes had already produced a “dramatic increase” in truck wait times.

On the West Coast, the case for added capacity is just as explicit. A recent SANDAG business case for Otay Mesa East says the existing Otay Mesa crossing is the second-busiest U.S.-Mexico truck port by volume and the third-largest by trade value. SANDAG argues that current demand is already impeding economic activity and that the new crossing is being designed specifically to deliver more predictable truck processing times. Phase I is targeted for early 2028.

Where the pressure is showing up

Laredo remains the primary truck gateway

Laredo remains the center of gravity for U.S.-Mexico surface freight. BTS said Laredo handled 38.8% of all inbound trucks from Mexico in 2025. The agency’s freight report also said the Port of Laredo facilitated more than $296 billion in annual freight with Mexico in 2025, underscoring how heavily North American manufacturing and distribution networks rely on one corridor.

That concentration is efficient when the system is running well. It is less forgiving when inspections intensify, staffing gets stretched, or trailers back up at transfer yards on either side of the border. Laredo’s importance also means local disruptions ripple far beyond South Texas into Midwest automotive plants, Gulf Coast industrial networks, and national distribution systems.

Pharr and the Rio Grande Valley remain highly exposed

Pharr is a key gateway for time-sensitive truck traffic, including perishables, food, and industrial loads moving through Reynosa and the broader northeast Mexico manufacturing belt. TxDOT has already flagged commercial delay concerns there, and the bridge expansion review warns that without added capacity, future crossing times could deteriorate sharply. The City of Pharr has also used temporary operational changes over time to relieve congestion, a sign that bridge management has had to keep adjusting to demand rather than relying on surplus capacity.

Otay Mesa reflects the California-Baja manufacturing load

Otay Mesa is critical for electronics, medical devices, aerospace suppliers, and broader Cali Baja manufacturing networks. The California freight planning framework identifies Otay Mesa as the busiest commercial crossing in California and one of the most important U.S.-Mexico truck gateways by value. With the new Otay Mesa East crossing still under development, the current port remains the main commercial valve for a region where nearshoring and binational manufacturing integration continue to deepen.

El Paso, Ysleta, Nogales and rail crossings still matter

The pressure story is not only about Laredo. BTS identifies Ysleta and Otay Mesa among the top truck ports with Mexico, while El Paso is one of the top rail connection points. Nogales also remains a major commercial crossing, particularly for produce and Arizona-Sonora trade. For shippers trying to diversify routing, the challenge is that alternate gateways often have their own infrastructure, inspection, or operating-hour constraints rather than large pools of unused capacity.

Nearshoring is one reason demand may stay elevated

The second recent development cited in the assignment also holds up under verification. In Kearney’s 2026 Foreign Direct Investment Confidence Index, Mexico climbed from 25th to 19th, re-entering the top 20 and ranking among the year’s biggest gainers. Kearney tied investor confidence to supply-chain reconfiguration, while Mexico-focused coverage linked the move directly to nearshoring momentum.

Actual investment data also remain strong. Mexico’s Economy Ministry reported that the country received a record $40.871 billion in foreign direct investment in 2025, according to government-linked summaries and subsequent reporting by Mexico News Daily and El País. While not all of that investment becomes immediate freight, it does support the basic thesis behind the current border story: more industrial activity in Mexico tends to mean more recurring cross-border moves in autos, machinery, electronics, industrial inputs, maintenance items, and finished goods.

That makes it harder to assume the corridor will simply “normalize” after an isolated disruption. If manufacturing footprints continue to deepen in northern and central Mexico, the baseline load on Laredo, Pharr, El Paso, Otay Mesa, and related rail connections may stay structurally higher.

What is driving the tightening?

The answer appears to be a combination of factors rather than a single cause.

1. Demand growth is colliding with finite infrastructure

The simplest explanation is still the most powerful: trade and freight value continue to rise faster than physical crossing capacity. New ports and expansions are underway, but major projects take years. Otay Mesa East, for example, is not expected to open until 2028.

2. Security and inspection intensity can absorb available slack quickly

Even when bridges are open and carriers have equipment, secondary inspections and non-intrusive inspection processes can consume throughput. CBP has repeatedly emphasized the trade-off between facilitation and enforcement at border cargo facilities, and past episodes show how quickly average waits can jump when inspection intensity rises.

3. The corridor still has little schedule resilience

High-volume industrial supply chains often rely on synchronized handoffs: cross-border drayage, customs clearance, transload or drop-yard turns, then longer-haul U.S. distribution. When one node slips, the system does not have much spare elasticity. A missed appointment or document discrepancy can turn a modest queue into a plant-facing delay.

4. Prior disruptions may fade from headlines without removing strain

The early-April strike in Mexico was an acute event. The current issue is different. Even if direct protest blockades subside, capacity can remain tight because underlying trade, equipment positioning, and gateway demand were already heavy.

What changes for freight execution

For industrial shippers and procurement teams, the practical implication is not necessarily that every shipment will be late. It is that reliability risk rises faster than volume growth when a border corridor operates close to its ceiling.

That can show up in several ways:

• northbound components arriving with less buffer for plant schedules;
• southbound replenishment or MRO shipments missing narrow delivery windows;
• higher accessorial or detention exposure near border transfer yards;
• fewer recovery options when customs entries contain errors;
• more pressure to secure backup drayage, trailer pools, or alternate crossings in advance.

The sectors most exposed are the ones already built around cadence and uptime: automotive and suppliers, machinery, electrical equipment, industrial manufacturing, medical devices, perishables, and maintenance-heavy operations that cannot tolerate uncertain border dwell.

What remains uncertain

The current evidence strongly supports the idea of structural tightening, but not yet a claim that the whole border is in crisis. Public, port-by-port truck delay data remain fragmented, and conditions can vary widely by hour, lane, commodity, inspection status, and crossing.

What is clear is that the system has become less forgiving. The strongest verified facts are these: bilateral trade is still high; trucking remains the dominant mode; freight is concentrated through a small number of ports; major public agencies are still building new capacity; and both public planners and private operators are explicitly framing predictability as the problem that new infrastructure is supposed to solve.

What to watch next

Three indicators will matter most over the next several weeks:

1. Gateway-specific fluidity at Laredo, Pharr, Otay Mesa, El Paso/Ysleta, and Nogales.
2. Customs and inspection conditions, especially if enforcement surges or staffing constraints change throughput.
3. Industrial investment follow-through in Mexico, which would support the view that elevated cross-border demand is not temporary.

If those indicators continue to point in the same direction, the February trade figure may end up looking less like a monthly headline and more like confirmation that North American supply chains are running harder against the limits of the border system.

For CAP Logistics readers, the immediate takeaway is practical: cross-border freight planning may need more lead time, tighter documentation discipline, and more deliberate gateway contingency planning than it did when the corridor had more slack.