U.S imposes tariffs against Mexico
March 4, 2025
The U.S. imposed a sweeping tariffs plan against Mexico, China and Canada at midnight US time, despite warnings it could spark an escalating trade war. China and Canada unveiled retaliatory measures immediately. (Guardian)
Yesterday Sheinbaum said she would wait and see if tariffs were put in place, but that Mexico has back-up plans. More details expected when she has her morning press conference today. "We have a plan B, C, D," Sheinbaum said, without giving details of the plans. (Reuters)
On Friday, U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said hat Mexico has proposed matching U.S. tariffs on China in a move that he described as "very interesting" and one that Canada should match. (Reuters)
“Tariffs will disrupt an incredibly successful trading relationship,” Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said, adding that they would violate the US-Mexico-Canada free trade agreement signed by Trump during his first term.
Sheinbaum has emphasized that Mexico will stand up for itself, but has also focused on attempting to meet U.S. demands on migration and tackling organized crime.
More Trade War
Faced with Trump’s tariff threats, Mexicans have rallied around their president and rekindled a sense of nationalism, reports the New York Times: “The Mexican government and businesses have rekindled a “Made in Mexico” campaign. Some Mexicans have called for boycotts of U.S. companies and products, while others have put together lists of Mexican stores and brands to support instead of American ones.”
The new rift between the U.S. and Mexico “risks completely upending major parts of the anti-crime fight. To begin with, it would walk back what has recently become a successful collaboration and intelligence sharing between the United States and Mexico after the often combative relationship under López Obrador,” notes InSight Crime.
Trump’s tariffs are posited as a response to cross-border flows of undocumented migrants and drugs, notably fentanyl. “But at the same time, the president has a broader goal: to encourage manufacturers to return to the United States after liberalized trade and outsourcing since the mid-1990s contributed to the loss of 4.5 million manufacturing jobs,” reports the Washington Post.
Migration
The number of migrants on the Mexican border with the U.S. has dropped dramatically — due not only to Trump’s crackdown on entries, but also Mexico’s own moves to restrict migration in the last year — not just at the border but throughout the country, reports the New York Times.
“Since December 2023, Mexico has conducted dramatically more migration enforcement and controls than in 2019, making it indispensable to managing migrant arrivals at the border today. And Mexico has absorbed many migrants who have stayed in Mexico rather than continuing their journey north. Finally, many of the border-related policies announced during the early days of this second Trump term in fact depend on Mexican cooperation,” notes a Migration Policy Institute Report.
El Salvador's offer to house deportees and U.S. citizens in its infamous prisons – for profit – signals a new and troubling escalation in the criminalization of migration, writes Timothy O’Farrell in Nacla. “The labeling of all migrants as criminals has become a key tactic to garner popular support for Trump’s mass deportation plan. Human rights groups fear that without due process and clear distinctions between these labels, innocent people targeted for deportation may end up in CECOT,” El Salvador’s notorious massive prison, a facility with a capacity of 40,000 that is specifically designed to house terrorists.
Costa Rica and Panama are coordinating to expedite southbound migrant transit through their countries along the same route that carried hundreds of thousands north in recent years, reports the Associated Press.
Guatemalan President Bernardo Arévalo told EFE that his government seeks to avoid U.S. deportations impacting Guatemala’s economy, and that if economic opportunities are not generated, the migrant crisis could worsen.
Regional Relations
U.S. aid cuts are having an extreme and immediate impact on thousands of children in Haiti, services that benefited from U.S. funding, such as malnutrition screening for babies, will be cut, according to UNICEF. (Reuters)
The long-term implications of the Trump administration’s decision to cut foreign aid “are incredibly damaging to U.S. interests,” writes James Bosworth in World Politics Review. “Along with the shock, the sudden collapse of funding is generating a sense of betrayal among civil society in Latin America— with good reason. The U.S. has broken its promises and let them down. They won’t easily trust the dependability of U.S. support in the future. Decades of efforts by the U.S. to shed its Cold War reputation are being swiftly undermined, not by an activist foreign policy that directly supports dictators, but by one that cuts off aid to the grassroots organizations on the front lines of Latin America’s efforts to push back creeping authoritarianism.”
Boz cautions against reading too much into any given Trump administration announcement regarding Venezuela: “My topline analysis regarding Venezuela policy under Trump right now is “No policy is final.” Whatever is announced this week can change next week.” (Latin America Risk Report)
Venezuela
Venezuela's Attorney General Tarek Saab said his office has requested that 110 people arrested during protests over a contested July election have their detention measures revised, bringing the total number of protesters freed over the last few months to 2,006, reports Reuters.
Brazil
Former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro’s possible arrest in relation to criminal investigations would reshape next year’s electoral process into a broader political conflict, challenging the right, writes Thomas Traumann in Americas Quarterly.
Argentina
Argentine President Javier Milei painted a rosy economic picture in his inauguration of Congressional sessions last Saturday, and said a new deal with the International Monetary Fund was imminent. He also proposed lowering the age of criminal responsibility. (Associated Press)
But the scenes that played out in the half empty chamber, the speech was boycotted by the opposition coalition Unión por la Patria, were more far controversial. The press was prohibited from entering the chamber, but leaked images show a how centrist lawmaker Facundo Manes waved a Constitution at Milei, verbally sparred with him and his close aide, Santiago Caputo, who made threatening gestures. Caputo, who heads the country’s spy agency, later approached Manes who said he was hit in the exchange. (La Nación, El País)
Yesterday, in a press conference, Trump said Milei is a great leader and he would be willing to consider a free trade agreement with Argentina. (Perfil)
Uruguay
Yamandú Orsi took office as Uruguay’s new president on Saturday. He has pledged to strengthen the social safety net while reversing years of economic stagnation, reports the Associated Press.
“As a moderate, Orsi has promised to strike a different balance between social welfare and economic growth by ushering in what he described as a "modern left" agenda,” reports Reuters.
The inauguration was attended by former President José Mujica, Orsi’s political mentor, and his wife, Lucía Topolansky. (El País)
Ecuador
An electoral court suspended the political rights of Ecuador’s Vice President Verónica Abad for engaging in what it said was gender-related violence, effectively removing her from office amid an ongoing political feud with President Daniel Noboa, reports Bloomberg.
Chile
The perfect star-gazing skies of Chile’s Atacama desert are under threat by a project by energy company AES Andes for the country’s first industrial-scale green hydrogen and ammonia processing plant, known as the Inna project, reports the Guardian.