Claudia Sheinbaum's Mexico on the front line on immigration issues

NORTH AMERICA – Private prisons are already rubbing their hands. In the program of Donald Trump, newly re-elected as head of the United States after beating Kamala Harris, the flagship measure is undoubtedly that which concerns immigration. Behind the fake news from the conservative camp targeting Haitian people or migrant people nicknamed “aliens”, the leader now has a free hand to carry out the mass expulsions promised during his campaign.

While according to our colleagues at HuffPost US, Trump's advisors have already made arrangements to discuss the construction of large transit camps before expulsion, the Mexican neighbor observes this with a slightly worried eye but tries to put on a good face. Thursday the President of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum, wanted to be reassuring. “We had a very cordial conversation with President-elect Donald Trump during which we talked about the good relationship that will exist between Mexico and the United States”declared the manager on her X account.

A key economic agreement to be renegotiated in a year

Feverish? There are reasons. During his campaign, Donald Trump threatened to impose 25% customs duties on Mexico if continued “this wave of criminals and drugs entering our country”. The key to such a measure is a potential economic earthquake for the neighbor, the main economic partner of the United States: more than 80% of Mexican exports are made on its northern border.

Additional source of concern: Canada and Mexico will have to put the USMCA agreement, a free trade agreement between the three countries, back on the table in 2026, with Washington. From here the path promises to be eventful. “ Trump likes to negotiate from a position of strength, which means he tends to use coercive speech to establish an extreme position from which he can negotiate.analysis for AFP, academic Pamela Starr, expert on US-Mexican relations at the University of Southern California.

Among Trump's levers, the threat to use force unilaterally at the border with an incursion into neighboring countries, or to expel 11 million undocumented migrants, including 5 million Mexicans. However, as the LA Times points out, each year the Mexican diaspora residing in the United States sends more than 60 million dollars to Mexico, “ an economic pillar of the country ».

Sheinbaum, ou l’anti-Trump

To delay and calm a second term deemed “more dangerous”, Claudia Sheinbaum will have a lot to do. It is an understatement to say that there is a contrast between the outrageous 47th American president and his neighbor. Left-wing when he's conservative, feminist when he “grabs women by the pussy”, scientific when he allies himself with an anti-vax…

But, according to Pamela Starr, these are assets for Claudia Sheinbaum. “ The problem (for Trump) is that Sheinbaum is not just a woman, but a strong and intelligent woman. And she's not the type of woman Donald Trump feels comfortable with (…) I think he's going to challenge her. But she's strong, and I suspect she'll fight back just as hard and he'll have to come to some sort of agreement with her.”she concludes.

A guarantee that everything remains possible: observers quoted in the Spanish press also point out the fact that during his first term, Donald Trump ended up letting himself be coaxed by Sheinbaum's predecessor and mentor, Andrés Manuel López Obrador. However, during his first campaign against Hillary Clinton by comparing Mexicans to “rapists”, promising to pay for the construction of his famous wall. Which he now intends to complete.

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