Trump made a horrible speech to the UN the other day, and he put Mexico on his long shitlist:
U.S. President Donald Trump told the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday that Mexico is the “epicenter” of cartel violence and “must reclaim control of its soil from the enemies of humanity.”
In response, President Claudia Sheinbaum said this:
Sheinbaum’s first response was to note that Trump also said “something else.”
“Let’s see, what did he say?” she asked, prompting the reporter to acknowledge that the U.S. president also said that his administration has “a very good relationship with the Mexican government.”
[…]
She then gave a pointed response to Trump’s declaration that it is “unacceptable” for the U.S. to share a border with a country “controlled by enemy cartels.”
“I could say it’s very difficult to live next to a country that has such a high level of illegal drug use,” Sheinbaum said.
“Or I could say it’s very difficult to live next to a country that produces so many guns,” she said.
“But I’m not going to say it,” Sheinbaum said, eliciting laughter from the press corps.
Moving on to trade, Trump is pulling the same shit with Mexico that he did with Canada:
The call stood out from all the rest for how lukewarm it had been described as. Conversations between Claudia Sheinbaum and Donald Trump have all tended to conclude with reports of a gushing exchange between both presidents. Their call last Wednesday ended up being “so-so,” reported an anonymous Mexican official to Politico.
The source mentioned that tension had arisen because Trump had made new demands in the negotiation surrounding the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA). Though no specifics were published in this case, over the past couple of weeks conversations with Mexican officials and publications by news outlets have revealed varying levels of effrontery:
One Mexican government official told The Mexico Political Economist that SPEI, Mexico’s public digital bank transfer system was being criticised by US negotiators for not allowing sufficient access to private payment companies, like Visa or Mastercard. This wouldn’t be a novel position, given Trump’s previous attacks on Brazil’s PIX payments system.
Then, last week, the Wall Street Journal reported that the US wanted limitations around AI-proximate hardware from China. This is unsurprising, but experts with knowledge of pressure on the Trump administration from AI behemoths like Meta and Google, told The Mexico Political Economist that additional demands were being considered regarding Mexico’s ability to access other artificial intelligence services.
The list surely goes on, in the meantime, the fourth round of US-Mexico negotiations have been delayed until further notice.
File this under a picture being worth a thousand words:
Republic of Korea President Lee Jay-Myung and You-Know-Who in Mexico City
In additon to receiving the ROK President yesterday, Claudia is also planning to attend the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Shenzen, China in November. Trade will obviously be on the agenda.
Mexico is just as tightly linked to the US as Canada is when it comes to trade, but Claudia and her trade team are obviously reading the writing on the wall, and they’re going to strengthen ties with their Asian trading partners.
Since Mexico isn’t beholden to Elon Musk the way the US is, they’re strengthening ties with Chinese EV makers. Earlier this year, Chinese EV makers BYD and Geely got into a bidding war to purchase a Nissan/Mercedes plant in Aguascalientes. When we were in Mexico, we saw a lot of BYD cars and trucks. There are probably many other trade deals that Mexico can strike with China and South Korea.
Mexico knows that they need to diversify their trading partners, but NAFTA and the USMCA made keeping the US as their main trading partner the path of least resistance. Trump is going to screw that up, in the way he screws up everything, which is probably for the best for Mexico’s future, and for the worse for us.
