The Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said on Monday that her country had previously avoided US tariffs after agreed with President Trump.
Sheinbaum, in A contribution to Xshe said
In return, she said that Mexico had agreed to strengthen his northern border with 10,000 members of the National Guard in order to combat migration and trade with illegal drugs.
At the weekend, President Trump announced that strong tariffs for goods from Mexico, Canada and China would be effective on Tuesday, which would increase the ghost of a disruptive trade war that could damage the economies of all three nations and increase the costs for US consumers dramatically .
Trump signed Executive Orders to absorb the tasks of 25% for imported goods from Mexico and Canada with an interest rate of 10% for Canadian energy products. The tariffs had violated a free trade pact of 2020, which Trump himself signed and celebrated as “the fairest, most balanced and advantageous trade agreement we have ever signed.
Trump also imposed a tax of 10% on all imports from China.
Trump said the tariffs were necessary because the three countries did not do enough to stop the flow of immigrants and drugs without papers to the United States. The white house insisted that the tariffs rEmain on the spot “Until the crisis is alleviated.” Trump repeatedly said that “nothing” would prevent him from imposing the tariffs.
Shortly after Trump's tariff announcement on Saturday, the leaders of Mexico and Canada announced that they would react by starting retaliation tax on US goods. China also said that it would “take appropriate countermeasures to firmly protect its rights and interests”.
In a speech, the Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau asked his citizens not to buy American products and announced two tariff waves against the United States. “Less than 1% of fentanyl and less than 1% of the illegal transitions to the United States come from Canada,” said Trudeau.
In an overview of the tariffs on Mexico, a document published by the White House says: “Organizations of the Mexican drug trade have an unbearable alliance with the government of Mexico.”
Sheinbaum has repaid this claim and highlighted in a position on X over the weekend in Mexico in the fight against drug dealers. She said that Mexico had confiscated more than 40 tons of drugs since she took office four months ago, including 20 million doses of fentanyl, and more than ten thousand people in connection with organized crimes.
She criticized the United States for its high drug consumption and asked Trump to combat drug sales more and combined Mexico's violence with the thousands of firearms that smuggled from the USA every year.
Sheinbaum jury, Mexico would also be reorganized with tariffs for products that are imported from the USA and added: “Problems are not solved by refusing tariffs, but by talking and working on dialogue.”
Mexico is the 13th largest economy in the world and the second largest in Latin America.
But no country loses more than Mexico in a trade war with the United States.
The US and Mexican trade deal with over 800 billion US dollars every year, and the United States is the goal of almost 83% of Mexican exports.
The tariffs could already destroy Mexico's shaky economy, say experts who immerse them in a recession. The Mexican peso fell to the lowest point compared to the duties in almost three years.
“Mexico is entering the territory because the tensions escalate with its largest trading partner,” said Matteo Ceurvels, analyst at Emarketer, a market research company. For Sheinbaum he said: “The administration of this economic gap will be one of the greatest tests of its presidency.”
Experts have warned that Mexico's destabilizing economy could lead to an increase in organized crime and cause a wave of migration to the United States.
“When Mexico goes into a recession, you will see an immigration boost,” said Joseph Brusuelas, chief economist at the auditing company RSM US.
Trump warned for months that he was planning to impose tariffs for imports in order to attract production to the United States. But he also sees tariffs as a negotiation tactic to extract compromises in other nations in matters that have little to do with trade.
Linthicum reported from Albuquerque. Cecilia Sánchez Vidal in the Mexico city office of the Times and the staff author Don Lee in Washington contributed to this report.