Mexico’s President Doesn’t Expect Trump’s Tariffs on Feb. 1
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President Claudia Sheinbaum brushed off a question as to whether Mexico is expecting U.S. President Donald Trump to announce 25% tariffs on Mexican goods Feb. 1.
“We don’t expect it will happen,” she said. “But if it does, we have our plan.”
She declined to elaborate on the plan for the tariffs, noting it would be announced “in due course.” Mexico’s Foreign Ministry is leading the dialog between the two countries, she added.
Expectations are mounting ahead of Feb. 1, a date Trump has signaled as a possibility for imposing tariffs on goods from its closest allies, Mexico and Canada. The actions could threaten the nearly $800 billion in trade per year between the two countries and call into question the protections offered by the U.S..-Mexico-Canada free trade agreement, which was signed by Trump in 2020.
Trump
Trump has said Mexico should take further action to reduce migration and drug-smuggling and expressed concern that China is using Mexico as a “backdoor” to send cheap goods into the U.S., affecting local producers. Over the past weeks, Sheinbaum has cracked down on Chinese imports and announced a plan to increase local content in everything from textiles to the chemicals industry, with incentives through 2030.
On the migration front, Mexico has continued to detain unauthorized migrants and send them to the south of the country, far from the border with the U.S. It has served as a holding area for those awaiting for a migration appointment through the CBP One app, which stopped working on the first day of Trump’s presidency.
The implementation of across-the-board tariffs on the two countries isn’t a foregone conclusion, Deutsche Bank analysts including Francisco Campos wrote in a note Jan. 29. Tariff risks are not priced into the Mexican peso, they added.
“Besetting this trade relationship could significantly disrupt economic activity and generate substantial inflationary pressures potentially becoming a political liability for the Trump administration,” the analysts wrote.
Sheinbaum added that the country’s electricity plan will be announced Feb. 6, and the plan for state-owned oil driller Petroleos Mexicanos will be released Feb. 12.
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