Mexico to stick with policies aimed at stopping migrants after Trump win
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A drone view showing migrants in a caravan walking along a highway on their way to the US border, in Escuintla, Mexico, on Nov 7.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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MEXICO CITY - Mexico will continue pursuing measures to stop migrants from reaching its northern border with the US, its top diplomat said on Nov 8, days after Donald Trump won the US presidential election
Foreign Minister Juan Ramon de la Fuente stressed that Mexico’s model is working and will stay in place, pointing to data that showed the number of migrants caught by the US authorities at the border had fallen 76 per cent since December.
“It’s working well and we’re going to continue on this path,” he told a press conference.
At the same conference, President Claudia Sheinbaum confirmed that she had spoken to Trump about the border in their first telephone call a day earlier, while also pointing to the sharp fall in migrant crossings.
“He raised the issue of the border, and he just said it, and I told him, ‘Yes, there is the issue of the border, but there will be space to talk about it,’” said Dr Sheinbaum, who described the conversation as “very cordial”.
Much like he did in his previous term as president, Trump has threatened to slap 25 per cent tariffs on all US-bound Mexican exports unless Mexico stops migrants and drugs from crossing the shared border.
Mexico is extraordinarily reliant on the US market, which is the destination of around 80 per cent of all Mexican exports.
Since the beginning of 2024, Mexico has quietly carried out a crackdown on migrants seeking entry into the US, including a growing programme to bus and fly non-Mexican migrants far to the south.
The crackdown followed pressure from the outgoing Biden administration and contrasts sharply with the Mexican government’s stated humanitarian goals, which aim to protect the human rights of migrants while creating employment opportunities for those who decide to stay in Mexico.
Dr Sheinbaum emphasised the humanitarian focus on Nov 8.
“What we are looking for is not only the containment of migration in the south, but also that there can be employment,” she said, stressing the need to attend to the root causes of migration.
But migration experts and advocates, who already consider the Mexican government’s migration policies too harsh, fear that these measures will only harden once Trump takes office.
“With the new US government, these (Mexican) enforcement measures will grow even stronger,” said Mr Jose Maria Garcia, the director of a migrant shelter in the northern border city of Tijuana.
Ms Darlin Castro, a Venezuelan migrant currently in southern Mexico, said she feels the country’s migration policies are hypocritical.
“Mexico says it helps migrants, but that is not the case,” she said. REUTERS
