President-elect Donald Trump continues to make news this week with controversial appointments and proposed policies. But one of his promises — specifically to impose a 25% tariff on products from Mexico — hits close to home here in Arizona.
Now Mexico says it’s ready to hit back with retaliatory tariffs of its own, which would hit automakers in the U.S. particularly hard.
Elvia Díaz says this move would be destabilizing for everyone. Díaz is editorial page editor of The Arizona Republic, and she joined The Show to talk more about it all.
Full conversation
LAUREN GILGER: You write that this move by Mexico to impose retaliatory tariffs is not just bravado. They’re not just talking here. It’s like survival for Mexico because so much of their economy depends on this. Tell us why.
ELVIA DÍAZ: As we know Mexico is the United States’ largest partner as well as Canada. And there is an agreement, a trade agreement between the two countries. And so when the main trading partner is threatening to impose tariffs, then that will be incredibly devastating for Mexico. No question whatsoever. The hardest hit here — if in fact Trump does it — would be Mexico.
And then there will be that collateral damage. Everyone is saying that Trump is doing this just as a short-term strategy objective because he promised during the campaign that he would stop illegal immigration and drug trafficking to the United States. And so if he can claim victory — as he apparently already did two or three days ago after he spoke with the Mexican president — then that might be the end of it.
And so we would hope, but it has already caused collateral damage, and we don’t know what Trump is going to do. So that’s still up in the air. And we’ll see.
GILGER: What would the impact be specifically, Elvia, on Arizona? You say that this move by Mexico would specifically hurt Arizona, among some other states.
DÍAZ: Well, let’s keep in mind that the United States manufactures a lot of these cars and Mexico. But then they’re also moving parts of those automobiles that go back and forth before they end up being in automobiles — a car or a truck or whatever. So that that will be at the top of that concern that they will hit automakers.
And already we saw when the announcement was made that Ford and General Motors, the stocks fell sharply right after the announcement. And then states like Arizona and Texas, California and others that depend largely on trade between Mexico — and not just on automobiles, it would be on everything from avocados to fruit to vegetables to all sorts of food. So you will see those prices rise. So even if it doesn’t happen, we’ll begin to see those prices.
And then imagine if, in fact, we can trade immediately with Mexico, that not only will we be paying more potentially, you know, for everything from cereal and all the other products that are mentioned, but also there will be a scarcity because we rely on each other.
So again, Mexico, yes, will be hit hardest. But then Arizona and the states that heavily rely on Mexico trade would also suffer.
GILGER: How might this potential kind of trade war affect issues though beyond that — like immigration, like the cartels in terms of the trade of fentanyl?
DÍAZ: When I wrote the column, the two presidents — President-elect Trump and the Mexican president — had not spoken. But since then there has been a phone call. And interestingly, both had a different understanding of what they meant in the call.
So Trump came out saying, “I won. Mexico is going to shut down the border. They’re going to stop immigration. You know, that’s what I want them to do.” And then the Mexican preside said, “Well no, not so fast. We are already largely stopping immigration in Mexico.” Those caravans that we saw before — I don’t believe there have been any of them since 2019 or 2020.
So the Mexican president said, “We’re already doing that, and we’re not going to shut the border down. We were not into that business. We actually want to build bridges between the two countries.”
But then, on the cartels and the fentanyl, what she was saying last week and keeps saying is that as long as the United States has a huge demand for fentanyl and other drugs, it’s going to be nearly impossible to stop the flow of drugs. So in fact, she was suggesting in so many words, “Deal with it, America. You have the problem. You have the demand. And also you have the powerful cartels that are just incredibly difficult to to control.”
GILGER: Right. And you make an interesting point about cartels that I want to make here. Because I think a lot of people assume that they could be stopped if we wanted to stop them, or if Mexico wanted to stop them. And Trump has threatened to invade Mexico, essentially, to stop cartels from doing what they’re doing. Is that possible?
DÍAZ: Well, it is possible that Trump is going to, in fact, send drones or the military and invade Mexico that way, then, yes, of course it is possible. But to expect that Mexico will rein in the cartels, which they haven’t done for decades.
It was in 2006 when the Mexican president decided that he was going to take on the cartels, and he did. It didn’t work, essentially. And what happened is incredible violence that has erupted in Mexico ever since, violence that the United States doesn’t want to see.
And then this Mexican president said she was going to do like her predecessor did and essentially not take on the cartels head-on because the cartels overpower the Mexican military.
And we have seen that many times. And she also mentions, and Mexicans also mention, that all those weapons — which is from AK-47s to AR-15s to what have you — are trafficked in from the United States into Mexico. So it is nearly impossible for the Mexican president to take on the cartels by herself.
Now, will she accept Donald Trump’s help militarily? No, because that has also been one of the contention points between the two countries, right? The sovereignty of Mexico.
So I don’t know, is Trump going to invade Mexico as he says? I don’t think so. But we’ll see. You never know with Trump.
