Mexico's President Claudia Sheinbaum shows a 17th century map during her daily press conference in Mexico City on January 8, 2025. The president proposed renaming the United States “Mexican America” in response to the U.S. president-elect Donald Trump who wants to rename the Gulf of Mexico “Gulf of America”. (AFP/ALFREDO ESTRELLA)
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum proposed Wednesday renaming the United States “Mexican America”, in response to US President-elect Donald Trump who wants to rename the Gulf of Mexico “Gulf of America”.
“Obviously, the Gulf of Mexico is a name recognized by the United Nations, why not call (the United States) Mexican America, that sounds good, right?”, quipped the Mexican president during her press conference usual.
“He talked about the name, we also talk about the name,” she added, in front of a world map dating from the 17th century and on which a good part of the North American region appears under the name America Mexican.
Ms. Sheinbaum, however, reiterated that she will maintain “a good relationship with President Trump”, based “on the good relationship that Mr. Trump had with President (Andrés Manuel) López Obrador” (2018-2024).
Mexico is the United States' largest trading partner.
“We are going to change the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America, it sounds good,” Mr. Trump declared on Tuesday, less than two weeks before his inauguration.
-“And Mexico must stop letting millions of people into our country,” he added during a provocative conference during which he repeated his ambitions to annex the Panama Canal and Greenland.
Donald Trump also claimed that Mexico was run by drug cartels, to which Mr. Sheinbaum replied that his country was “governed by the people.”
The president-elect has threatened to impose 25% tariffs on Mexican imports if Mexico does not stop illegal migrants and drugs from entering his country.
He also announced that he would classify Mexican cartels as terrorist groups.
He had already considered this measure during his previous mandate (2017-2021), finally putting it on hold at the request of the Mexican president at the time, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who agreed to cooperate on security matters but rejected a possible American military presence on its territory.
Ms. Sheinbaum still rejects this measure today, citing the same argument as Mr. López Obrador.
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