One of many extra stunning international coverage concepts the Trump crew has proposed on the eve of its ascension to energy is army intervention in Mexico to go after drug cartels and probably cease migrants headed to america.
The thought appeared so wild and provocative — siccing U.S. troops on a peaceable neighbor — that Mexican officers figured it was nothing greater than Trump bluster aimed toward revving up his base.
However now President-elect Donald Trump’s alternative of Ronald D. Johnson to function ambassador to Mexico has them questioning if he’s severe.
Johnson is each a former U.S. army officer — a Inexperienced Beret — and a former CIA official. And in his earlier publish as U.S. ambassador to El Salvador, Johnson was an enthusiastic enforcer of Trump’s insurance policies in assist of its president, Nayib Bukele, an authoritarian broadly accused of human rights abuses in an enormous crackdown on gangs and in silencing dissent.
Trump has already threatened Mexico with 25% tariffs on lots of its exports to the U.S. — together with tomatoes, avocados, tequila and automotive elements — if the federal government of President Claudia Sheinbaum doesn’t “do extra” to cease the entry of migrants and fentanyl into the U.S. over its southern border with Mexico.
Many economists say such an motion wouldn’t solely blow up costs for U.S. customers but additionally most likely ship the Mexican financial system right into a free fall, which in flip may spur extra migration to america.
“Mexico can count on monumental strain,” Maureen Meyer, packages vice chairman on the Washington Workplace on Latin America, mentioned in an interview. The main focus might be virtually solely on immigration and regulation enforcement, she predicted, whereas “problems with concern to the human rights neighborhood — reproductive rights, local weather, democracy — will all take a step again.”
She and others mentioned that can most likely be true throughout Latin America as a Trump authorities fortifies frequent trigger with right-wing governments and events in Argentina, Brazil and elsewhere, however can have probably the most impression in Mexico due to its 2,000-mile border with america and its shut financial and cultural ties.
Johnson, to not be confused with the Republican Wisconsin senator of the identical identify, has resided in Florida since stepping down as ambassador to El Salvador on the finish of the primary Trump administration. He’s an Alabama native, married with 4 grown kids and 5 grandchildren, and frolicked in Iraq and Afghanistan as a part of his CIA duties. He additionally labored on counter-insurgency operations throughout El Salvador’s civil battle within the Nineteen Eighties, when the U.S. supported the right-wing authorities towards leftist guerrillas.
“Ron will work intently with our nice Secretary of State Nominee, [Florida Sen.] Marco Rubio, to advertise our Nation’s safety and prosperity by robust America First Overseas Insurance policies,” Trump mentioned on Reality Social in asserting the nomination this month.
“Collectively, we are going to put an finish to migrant crime, cease the unlawful circulate of Fentanyl and different harmful medicine into our Nation and MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN!” Trump wrote. This week, Trump added a plan to designate Mexican drug cartels as terrorists, a step that could be used as authorization for deploying U.S. troops.
In his marketing campaign platform, Trump mentioned he would order the Pentagon to make use of “particular forces, cyber warfare, and different covert and overt actions to inflict most harm on cartel management, infrastructure, and operations.”
But it surely stays unclear what number of of those steps Trump may take unilaterally. Terrorist designations often require motion by different businesses, such because the State Division, and a few members of Congress who advocate a more durable method to Mexican drug trafficking are nonetheless reluctant to ship U.S. troops into the fray with out approval by the Mexican authorities.
In Mexico, information of Johnson’s nomination was greeted warily, with many seeing a transparent sign of the Trump administration’s supposed, slender focus.
Johnson’s “resume is the message,” Jorge Castañeda, a former international minister in Mexico, mentioned in an essay for the Nexos information web site. “Johnson has no expertise in financial, business or monetary issues. He isn’t coming to Mexico for that.”
The place Johnson does have ample expertise is in counter-insurgency.
Johnson most likely “will demand a change within the safety technique in Mexico,” mentioned Mexican commentator León Krauze. “Trump likes spectacle, and has lengthy thought-about the potential of delivering to his voters photographs of unilateral incursions into Mexican territory to arrest main drug lords, Hollywood-style.”
Many in Mexico are weary of U.S. intervention in safety issues and blame the U.S. partially for backing former President Felipe Calderon’s army assault on drug cartels starting in 2006, which sparked devastating ranges of violence that persist to this present day. Nonetheless others, simply as exhausted by excessive homicide and kidnapping charges, and having misplaced confidence in Mexican regulation enforcement typically purchased off by criminals, have began to lean towards welcoming U.S. troops.
Safety cooperation between the U.S. and Mexico diminished drastically throughout the presidency of Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who accused U.S. forces of “abusive meddling” in 2020 when the previous Mexican protection secretary, Salvador Cienfuegos, was arrested at Los Angeles Worldwide Airport on suspicion of drug trafficking.
López Obrador pressured the Trump administration to return Cienfuegos to Mexico, the place he was awarded a serious army ornament. The harm strained U.S.-Mexico relations and hampered work in Mexico by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.
Sheinbaum, who took workplace Oct. 1, is equally more likely to be reticent in cooperating with Trump.
After his preliminary threats about army assault and tariffs, she telephoned him at his resort in Mar-a-Lago after which posted on X that Mexico would cooperate with the U.S. on related subjects, however that the nation wouldn’t bend to the desire of the U.S. because it had in drug battle that started in 2006.
“We’re going to collaborate .. however with out subordinating ourselves,” she wrote. “We’ll all the time defend Mexico as a free, sovereign and impartial nation.”
Eschewing the military-heavy method of a few of her predecessors may set Sheinbaum on a collision course with Trump and Johnson.
Sheinbaum “shouldn’t be a Bukele kind,” mentioned Rep. Jim McGovern, a Massachusetts Democrat who focuses on Latin America and has been extremely vital of the Salvadoran chief. “She desires good relations with Mexico … however shouldn’t be seeking to kiss Trump’s ring.”
One other main query is how Johnson would deal with human rights points in Mexico.
In El Salvador, the place he was ambassador from 2019 to 2021, Johnson shunned criticizing Bukele as the federal government rounded up tens of hundreds of individuals in an effort to cut back gang crime. Some had gang affiliations, however many didn’t. Based on human rights organizations, most have been denied due course of, innocents together with kids have been detained, and a whole bunch have been tortured in jail and died. Murder charges declined considerably, though there’s dispute over by how a lot.
Johnson additionally didn’t sound the alarm over Bukele’s makes an attempt to stack the nation’s Congress and the Supreme Court docket with loyalists in what critics have described as an influence seize that eroded El Salvador’s hard-fought democracy.
Bukele ceaselessly spoke of his heat friendship with Johnson. The 2 have been photographed yachting collectively within the Pacific off El Salvador’s coast. In June, lengthy after Johnson had left his posting as ambassador, he joined Donald Trump Jr., Tucker Carlson and Rep. Matt Gaetz to attend Bukele’s inauguration to a questionably authorized second time period.
It’s extremely unlikely Johnson can have an identical relationship with Sheinbaum, Mexico’s first feminine president, a local weather scientist by coaching, and consultant of a leftist political celebration.
Wilkinson reported from Washington and Linthicum from Mexico Metropolis. A particular correspondent in San Salvador additionally contributed.
