By James Osborne | Houston Chronicle | Tuesday, July 20, 2021

WASHINGTON - A bipartisan group of Texas congressmen and senators are calling on the Biden administration to pressure Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador to back off efforts to roll back energy reforms that opened Mexico's energy sector to U.S. companies for the first time in more than 70 years.

In a letter to President Joe Biden Tuesday, Republicans Sens. John Cornyn and Ted Cruz, along with Democratic House members Lizzie Fletcher of Houston, Vicente Gonzalez of McAllen, and Henry Cuellar of Laredo, said Mexico was in violation of the United States Mexico Canada free trade agreement through legislation passed this year that favors Mexican energy companies over foreign competitors.

"We ask that you address these violations when engaging in diplomatic discussions with President Lopez Obrador," the letter read. "This is necessary to not only establish a level playing field for U.S. companies operating in Mexico, but also to allow for competition in the energy market that will protect American jobs and ultimately drive down consumer cost and greenhouse gas emissions."

Since Mexico passed constitutional reforms in 2013 to end the monopoly of state-owned energy companies like Pemex, U.S. companies have invested billions of dollars in Mexico's energy sector.

But following the 2018 election of Lopez Obrador, who campaigned against the decision to open up Mexico's energy sector as harmful to workers, those investment have begun to fall into doubt. Earlier this month Mexico announced that Pemex would lead development of an oil and gas field in the Gulf of Mexico that had been discovered by Houston-based Talos Energy.

Earlier this year The Mexican Legislature has also passed legislation ending a move to open up Mexico's fuel market to retailers other than Pemex and ordering Mexico's power grid to give preference to plants operated by the state-owned utility Federal Electricity Commission.

Tuesday's letter followed a similar effort to get the Trump administration to pressure Lopez Obrador. Former energy secretary Dan Brouillette wrote a letter to his counterpart in Mexico last year, cautioning that “business uncertainty leads investors to delay or change their plans, and without investment an economy cannot grow.”

Other politicians signing the letter include Sen. James Inhofe, of Oklahoma, and Rep. Garret Graves, of Louisiana, as well as Texas Congressmen Randy Weber, R-Beaumont, Michael Burgess, R-Lake Dallas, Michael Cloud, R- Corpus Christi, Filemon Vela, D-Brownsville, and Marc Veasey, D-Dallas.