In a flurry of tweets over the weekend, President Trump made it clear to Mexico that, if the do nothing to stop the flow of illegal immigrants and drugs, the US will lock them out of the lucrative North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).
As concern grows daily about the dangerous drugs, and criminal immigrants flowing into the country from the Mexican border, Trump blamed Mexico directly. Declaring that Mexico was doing “very little, if nothing” to stop narcotics and illegal immigrants from flowing across the border.
Meanwhile, In Mexico, leading Presidential candidate – and Socialist – Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador denounced Trump and the Wall, opining that social problems cannot be solved with walls. “Mexico and its people will not be the pinata of any foreign government,” Lopez Obrador said.
However, with NAFTA on the line – the economic lifeline of their nation – political leaders in Mexico may soon take a more conciliatory tone. With a filthy horde of “caravan immigrants” heading straight through Mexico to the US, Trump has called for a national security solution.
Just weeks ago, Secretary of Defense, Jim Mattis talked with Trump about how the Pentagon’s budget can – and cannot – be utilized under existing funding rules, to build a border wall.
In the interim, renegotiation talks on NAFTA have become progressively worse, and more combative, as trade representatives from Canada, and Mexico are forced to deal with the new, America First, demands of the Trump Administration. If renegotiation fails, or the US wants to pull out completely, full deconstruction of NAFTA is expected to only take 6 months.
