PBS NEWSHOUR WEEKEND, LISA DESAI:

At Precision Mold and Tool, this is business as usual.

This company in San Antonio, Texas, creates plastic parts and molds for industries in the United States and around the world. Domingo Auces is the Vice President of Operations.

You know, parts like you don't notice and use every day like the remote control that you use for your TV, the buttons on your laptop, the buttons on your shirt..

With sales topping 12 million dollars last year, Precision Mold and Tool is one of many small businesses that make Texas the number one state for foreign exports.

The Lone Star state depends heavily on The North American Free Trade agreement, or NAFTA, signed in San Antonio by President Bill Clinton in 1993.

The agreement allows goods and services to move more freely — without tariffs — across the borders of the U-S, Canada, and Mexico. The benefits promised to Americans were economic growth, access to cheaper products, and more American jobs.

According to the Census Bureau, since NAFTA took effect, U-S trade with Canada and Mexico has grown steadily and tripled by 2015 to a trillion dollars a year. And a 2014 study by the U-S Chamber of Commerce, shows that nearly 5 million American jobs — including 350-thousand in Texas — are supported by increased trade from NAFTA.

Auces' company is among those that reaped these benefits. It started in 1985 with just two workers in a garage. Today, more than 60 workers are employed at three factories — two in Texas and one in Mexico.