Farmers across the Rio Grande Valley met in Mercedes on Thursday as the head of the International Boundary and Water Commission visits Mexico to press the country to pay its water debt.

IBWC Commissioner Chad McIntosh’s visit comes as Valley farmers struggle to maintain their land without water.

“He is very much advocating for the Texas agricultural community, so rest assured he is out there really arguing for this stuff,” IBWC spokesperson Frank Fisher said during the thursday meeting.

So far, Mexico has only given the U.S. less than 800,000 acre feet of the 1,750,000 acre feet of water that they need to deliver every five years as part of a water treaty between both counties. 

The rest needs to be delivered by October 2025.

An IBWC hydrologist said negotiations with Mexico to deliver water are delicate.

“It's just a sensitive nature with the negotiations going on in Mexico City right now — we don't want to jeopardize that,” Delbert Humberson said.

In April 2025, the U.S. State Department said Mexico committed to make an immediate transfer of water from international reservoirs, and increase the U.S. share of the flow in six of Mexico’s Rio Grande tributaries through October.

McIntosh will return from Mexico on Saturday.

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