Washington, D.C. – U.S. Senator Katie Britt (R-Ala.) has joined Senator Bill Hagerty (R-Tenn.) and a bipartisan group of Senate colleagues in reintroducing the Defending American Property Abroad Act of 2025. The legislation aims to impose retaliatory restrictions on any country within the Western Hemisphere that unlawfully seizes U.S.-owned assets.
The bill responds to continued efforts by the Mexican government to take control of a deep-water port owned by Birmingham-based Vulcan Materials Company. Lawmakers assert that this action violates the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), which governs trade between the three nations.
“The threats toward Vulcan’s lawfully permitted, U.S.-owned deep-water port from the Government of Mexico, even under a new president, have not ceased,” said Senator Britt. “Mexico continues to flagrantly violate international law with its actions, putting America’s and Alabama’s economic and national security at risk — and it won’t stand.”
The Defending American Property Abroad Act would give the U.S. Department of Homeland Security the authority to prohibit vessels from entering U.S. ports if they have previously utilized facilities or infrastructure that were unlawfully seized from a U.S. company. Additionally, the bill empowers the U.S. Trade Representative to investigate and address unfair treatment or expropriation of U.S. business assets by foreign governments.
Senator Hagerty emphasized the broader implications of the issue: “Under the leadership of Mexico’s previous president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, and now the current president, Claudia Sheinbaum, the Mexican government is committing a blatant theft against a major American company and, by extension, the United States itself.”
Vulcan’s operations in Quintana Roo, Mexico, have been a point of contention since 2018, when the company filed for arbitration under the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). In 2022, the Mexican military forcibly shut down Vulcan’s operations at the site. On March 14, 2023, Mexican military and police forces reportedly confiscated Vulcan’s port facility at Punta Venado at gunpoint, prompting bipartisan condemnation in the U.S.
Senator Britt joined a bipartisan congressional letter to Mexico’s ambassador, Esteban Moctezuma, condemning the seizure. Following discussions with the ambassador, Mexican forces later withdrew from the property, though threats against Vulcan’s operations have persisted.
In May 2024, Senators Britt, Tim Kaine (D-Va.), Hagerty, and Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) wrote to Mexico’s Secretary of Foreign Affairs Alicia Bárcena, calling for a reversal of actions taken against Vulcan. Despite these efforts, in September 2024, the Government of Mexico seized Vulcan’s deep-water port, a move U.S. officials view as a flagrant expropriation.
Senator Britt had previously supported this legislation during the 118th Congress and continues to advocate for protections ensuring American companies are not subject to unlawful seizures abroad.
