Within the weeks earlier than he took workplace, Donald J. Trump repeatedly vowed to hold out the most important deportations in U.S. historical past and to militarize the border, all whereas his transition staff rebuffed requests from regional leaders to satisfy over the results of his promised strikes.
He made international locations corresponding to Mexico targets of his assaults, claiming migrants had been flooding the US with fentanyl and threatening to implement devastating tariffs. He additionally zeroed in on Panama, repeatedly asserting that the nation had permitted China to take management, compelling the US to intervene and reclaim the Panama Canal.
In order Mr. Trump was inaugurated in Washington on Monday, the everyday congratulatory messages had been additionally accompanied by some from Latin American leaders that deviated sharply from the same old diplomatic norms.
“There isn’t a motive why Mexico ought to preserve its head down or really feel lesser than. We’re an ideal nation, a cultural energy,” mentioned President Claudia Sheinbaum throughout her every day morning information convention. “Our relationship with the US can be certainly one of equals.”
She additionally tried to reassure unauthorized Mexicans residing in the US who may face removing. “Mexicans are essential to the U.S. financial system, and the Trump administration is aware of it,” Ms. Sheinbaum mentioned. “To our countrymen and ladies: You aren’t alone, and you could stay calm.”
Mexico is the nation with the best variety of undocumented immigrants in the US, with round 4 million Mexicans residing there with out authorization as of 2022, in accordance with the Pew Analysis Heart.
Mexico’s overseas minister, Juan Ramón de la Fuente, additionally mentioned on Monday that Mexico wouldn’t help the anticipated transfer to reinstate a coverage generally known as Stay in Mexico, which beneath the primary Trump presidency pressured migrants making use of for asylum to attend in Mexico till the time of their hearings in immigration court docket. The coverage was a boon for drug cartel members, who focused asylum seekers to extort, kidnap and rape them, human rights groups say.
“Sure, they will do it; it’s their proper,” Mr. de la Fuente mentioned of the US. However whereas permitting that “some agreements” may very well be reached, he identified that Mexico had no authorized obligation to course of migrants’ asylum requests for the US.
Hours later, in a message on social media, Ms. Sheinbaum congratulated Mr. Trump. “As neighbors and buying and selling companions, dialogue, respect and cooperation will at all times be the image of our relationship,” she wrote.
However throughout a marathon session of signing govt orders, Mr. Trump mentioned Monday that he would slap 25 % tariffs on Mexico and Canada on Feb. 1, accusing each international locations, as he has previously, of permitting undocumented immigrants and fentanyl into the US. Ms. Sheinbaum and a few of her administration officers have beforehand mentioned Mexico must hit again on the US with their very own tariffs.
Following Mr. Trump’s inauguration, the president of Honduras, Xiomara Castro, who warned earlier this month that she was ready to expel the U.S. army from the nation if Mr. Trump pursued mass deportations, restricted herself to sending a well mannered message welcoming him again into workplace.
However the nation’s deputy overseas minister, Tony García, mentioned in a phone interview on Monday afternoon that his nation and a number of other of its neighbors didn’t plan to just accept massive numbers of flights carrying deportees with out first negotiating the method with the incoming administration.
“They will’t be finished unilaterally,” he mentioned, of mass deportations.
Mr. García mentioned that whereas there are at the moment no plans to finish Honduras’s army settlement with the US, which allows U.S. operations from a big army base, the Castro administration remains to be contemplating it as a possible possibility, so “they take us extra critically.”
The overseas ministers of a number of international locations met final week to debate their response to the incoming Trump administration in Mexico Metropolis, together with Belize, Brazil, Colombia, Cuba, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Mexico and Venezuela. In keeping with Mr. García, the international locations agreed that they’d not “enable anybody to be deported by drive. If a rustic says nobody can are available, not one airplane can contact down.”
Honduras is estimated to have about 525,000 unauthorized immigrants residing in the US, in accordance with the Pew Analysis Heart. Mr. García mentioned it had obtained flights carrying greater than half one million deportees from the US within the final decade. He mentioned the nation deliberate to proceed receiving such flights, however the two governments needed to work out a plan first.
“We’re in favor of coordination,” he mentioned. “Not subordination.”
His had been a few of the sharpest phrases for the brand new president.
In Panama, a goal of Mr. Trump’s current criticisms, together with his false claims that China controls the Panama Canal and that the US ought to take it again, President José Raúl Mulino roundly rejected the president’s assertions, which he repeated throughout his inaugural speech.
“The Canal is and can proceed to belong to Panama and its administration will proceed to be beneath Panamanian management,” Mr. Mulino said in a statement posted on X.
Nevertheless, later within the day, the Panamanian comptroller’s workplace introduced that auditors had visited the county’s maritime authorities to provoke an audit of Panama Ports Firm, a Hutchison Ports Holding subsidiary. The corporate is a significant ports operator and the nation’s most important port concessionaire. It’s also a part of CK Hutchison Holdings, a Hong Kong-based conglomerate.
“The aim of this exhaustive audit is to make sure the environment friendly and clear use of public assets,” the comptroller’s workplace said.
Mr. Trump’s inaugural deal with — during which he mentioned he would “repel the disastrous invasion of our nation” — ceaselessly took purpose on the area, as did lots of the govt orders he signed Monday night time.
However some leaders reaffirmed their intention to work with the brand new president and help his coverage targets.
President Nayib Bukele of El Salvador, who has shut ties to Mr. Trump and his household, was invited to the inauguration however didn’t attend, mentioned Cindy Portal, a Salvadoran senior overseas ministry official, in a radio interview. As an alternative, the nation was represented by its ambassador to the US.
Ms. Portal didn’t point out any plans to push again once more deportations of Salvadorans, which additionally make up one of many largest teams of unauthorized immigrants within the nation. El Salvador had 750,000 unauthorized immigrants residing in the US in 2022, in accordance with the Pew Analysis Heart.
As an alternative, Ms. Portal emphasised the Bukele administration’s ties each to Mr. Trump’s son and Marco Rubio, Mr. Trump’s secretary of state, who was confirmed Monday night time.
“The message we’re giving Salvadorans as the federal government of El Salvador is to attend and never get forward of ourselves,” she mentioned. “President Trump has been clear about returning unhealthy individuals who went in to destroy.”
She mentioned if Salvadorans haven’t dedicated a criminal offense in the US, they don’t have anything to worry.
International locations within the area which were economically remoted by U.S. sanctions had a wide range of responses to Mr. Trump’s return to energy and his flurry of orders. Nicaragua’s authorities remained silent, whereas Venezuela’s inside minister wished Mr. Trump “the perfect.”
Cuba’s President Miguel Díaz-Canel denounced “the fraudulent designation of Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism,” in a message on social media. “The results of the acute financial siege measures imposed by Trump has been to impress shortages amongst our individuals and a big improve within the migratory circulation from Cuba to the US,” the assertion mentioned.
However, in a shift, international locations which were shut buying and selling companions of the US additionally noticed their economies menaced. By late Monday, Mexican leaders had not but responded to Mr. Trump’s tariffs risk. However Canada’s finance minister, Dominic LeBlanc, did.
“Our nation is completely prepared to reply to any certainly one of these eventualities,” Mr. LeBlanc mentioned. “We nonetheless proceed to consider that it will be a mistake.”
Reporting was contributed by Simon Romero, James Wagner and Yubelka Mendoza from Mexico Metropolis; Matina Stevis-Gridneff from Toronto; Genevieve Glatsky from Bogotá, Colombia; Mary Triny Zea from Panama Metropolis; Gabriel Labrador from San Salvador; Jody García from Guatemala Metropolis; and Joan Suazo from Tegucigalpa, Honduras.
