A new US - Mexico security agreement in the making
by Gerónimo Gutiérrez. Ambassador Gutiérrez served as Mexico’s Ambassador to the United States and as Mexico’s Deputy Secretary for Governance and Homeland Security.
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Last week tensions between the US and Mexico governments surfaced again. President Sheinbaum denied the existence of an agreement between the Drug Enforcement Agency and the Mexican government. Her comments were directed towards a press release from the DEA announcing the launch of a “bold bilateral initiative to dismantle cartel gatekeepers and combat synthetic drug trafficking”. In my view, the rebuttal appears to be more the result of miscommunication than of the lack of willingness on both sides to strengthen cooperation. In fact, Sheinbaum confirmed that some form of security agreement is in the making and could be formalized in the next few weeks during a visit to Mexico of Secretary of State Marco Rubio. This was overlooked and could potentially be good news. Here are four takeaways of last week’s episode…
Spoiler alert: this gets complicated
In response to statements emanating from the Mexican presidential bully pulpit that with the United States “we are doing better than any other country,” that “we dialogue with respect and on equal terms,” and that “we coordinate, we collaborate, but we do not subordinate ourselves,”— and also in response to narratives about how Mexico and its president deal with Donald Trump — a steady dose of realism and a reality check - in Mexico’s Congress and across the media, business organizations, and society at large- are urgently required, and we need to carefully weigh where things stand.
While navel gazing in the current juncture of the relationship with the US may feed egos and polls, it’s also dangerous. It can make us short-sighted and cause us to lose sight of the reality looming beyond the horizon. This is especially true since 2018, when Mexico irresponsibly turned its back on the world and on its closest diplomatic and trading partner. But - with Trump having once again kicked the can down the road - Mexico now faces 90 days of uncertainty on tariffs. That’s on top of the looming threat of the unilateral US force against transnational criminal organizations, and a steady stream of pressure points from Washington on a wide-ranging number of issues across our shared bilateral agenda. At no time since her swearing in and — more importantly — during the six months that Sheinbaum’s government has coexisted with the new US administration, has such a national discussion been so urgent in Mexico.
What Mexican governments — both this one and the previous — have failed to grasp is…
Unilateral US military intervention in Mexico would bring chaos
by Luis Rubio, political analyst and chairman of México Evalúa.
For months, talk has been circulating about a possible US military intervention in Mexico. The idea has gained traction here due to the presence of American intelligence ships in the Gulf of California and, more recently, the sighting of a drone over Valle de Bravo. The issue is also alive in the United States, at least since several Mexican criminal organizations were designated as terrorist groups. In fact, the debate has been simmering for years, as observers there note the growing chaos in certain regions of Mexico and the Mexican government’s seeming inaction. A recent video lays out, quite clearly, the perspective many Americans hold on the matter. No one knows if actual military action might occur — whether directly on the ground or indirectly from the air — but it is a subject that deserves careful analysis.
The video (viewable below) features Joshua Treviño at 35 seconds in. Treviño is a former US Army adviser now with America First, introduced — incorrectly — as a seasoned observer of US–Mexico relations. As I argue below, he has little to no understanding of the situation on the Mexican side…
Does Mexico have a bargaining advantage over Canada?
Mexico expelled 26 narco bosses to the United States on Wednesday, responding to the Trump administration to crack down on drug cartels. Among those expelled were Servando Gómez Martínez, “La Tuta,” a former mouthpiece for La Familia Michoacana.
It resembled a similar expulsion of 29 narco bosses – including Rafael Caro Quintero, a man long sought by the Drug Enforcement Administration for the 1985 killing of agent Enrique (Kiki) Camarena.
President Claudia Sheinbaum defended handing over the capos as “sovereign decisions” and stating, “The decision is for our country’s security.”
The expulsions followed revelations in The New York Times that U.S. President Donald Trump quietly signed a directive allowing the use of military force against terror organizations in the Western Hemisphere. Those terror organizations include Mexican drug cartels.
Sheinbaum immediately responded…
The Morena Pact
In 1989, a series of protests and disturbances in China culminated in the massacre at Tiananmen Square, Beijing’s central plaza. The event shook not only China, but also the outside world, which had placed its hopes on reintegrating China into the community of nations. No less important, the bloodshed threatened the country’s ongoing process of economic transformation. Gradually, internal peace was restored, and an implicit social pact was forged that became the cornerstone of the spectacular economic growth that followed. That pact consisted of an implicit exchange: the government would do whatever was necessary to ensure rapid economic and living standard growth, in return for the population’s acceptance of the Communist Party’s exclusive rule and a commitment not to challenge the political system. The result was staggering.
Although Mexico is not — and cannot be — like China, Morena has been gradually advancing toward a similar arrangement, also implicitly. The Morena pact, articulated over the course of the previous sexenio, reveals not only the nature of Morena, with its dogmas and factions, but also the country’s current moment. One way to describe it is as a tacit agreement whereby the population accepts that there will be no economic growth, jobs, or a functioning health system in exchange for the continuation of social programs and cash transfers.
Of course, this is not a formal agreement, nor one that is explicitly recognized, but rather a de facto exchange that was shaped during the previous administration and that now explains the two most relevant factors in national politics: first, the president’s high popularity, and second, the elevated consumption levels among Mexico’s lower middle class — the primary beneficiaries (and clientele) of the government.
This also explains…
Sheinbaum’s monologue diplomacy is meeting Washington’s deaf ear
by David Agren, writer-at-large.
Shortly after rumours started that Ovidio Guzmán – son of imprisoned Sinaloa cartel boss Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán – might plead guilty on drug trafficking charges and accept a deal with US prosecutors to turn state’s witness, influencers for Mexico’s ruling party settled on a narrative for denouncing the US government’s actions: It was negotiating with terrorists.
President Claudia Sheinbaum repeated that narrative, too. From the podium of her mañanera press conference, she objected to the deal with the younger Guzmán, while noting the lack of cross-border coordination in the plea bargaining process and reiterating her opposition to the Trump administration’s designation of six drug cartels as foreign terror organizations. "They have a policy of not negotiating with terrorists,” she said. “They decided to designate certain criminal organizations as terrorists. So let them report whether there's an agreement or not."
Sheinbaum’s comments didn’t go unnoticed. Jeffrey Lichtman, Ovidio’s lawyer, plainly stated why the Mexican government wouldn’t be a party to any plea agreement: a lack of trust dating back to 2020 and the decision to send former defence secretary Gen. Salvador Cienfuegos back to Mexico after he was indicted on drug charges in the United States.
The war of words heated up as Sheinbaum, who doesn’t let any slight go unanswered, called Lichtman’s comments “disrespectful” and promised to…
The roots and costs of Mexico’s vast informal economy
by Macario Schettino.
For some time now, there has been a belief that previous generations lived better than today's. Many young people, for example, complain that they cannot afford to buy a home in a central location, as their parents or grandparents did. In the United States, there is nostalgia for the 1950s — a nostalgia that, as always, erases the negative parts, such as racism and discrimination against women, among other things.
In Mexico’s case, this nostalgia was fed in classrooms when emphasis was placed on something called the “Mexican economic miracle,” or by its local name: desarrollo estabilizador (stabilizing development). The story goes that from 1946 to 1971, Mexico achieved very high growth rates (6% annually, 3% in per capita GDP), and nostalgia paints a picture of orderly, clean cities with abundant jobs.
As with all legends, there’s some truth — but not too much. In Mexico, during the time being referred to, the country was still essentially rural. It wasn’t until 1960 that half the population lived in cities, and it was precisely that process of urbanization that began to complicate everything. Cities could not expand their infrastructure at the same rate as the population was growing, and even less so when the demographic growth rate exceeded 3% annually. By the 1970s, medium and large cities in Mexico already had belts of poverty and “lost cities”: towns swallowed up by urban expansion.
If in the 1960s it seemed like there were jobs for everyone, it was because only half the population lived in urban areas. As that urban population grew, the myth of full employment began to fade. To prevent this urban growth from spinning out of control, Mexico took on excessive external debt in the 1970s — just as all Latin American countries did — taking advantage of abundant petrodollars and the end of restrictions on international capital flows. In 1981, with anti-inflationary programs in the US and UK, everything collapsed.
Since then…
There’s a lot more driving Mexico City’s gentrification than bad gringos
by David Agren.
The acerbic signs and graffiti criticizing gentrification in Mexico City’s fashionable neighbourhoods were certain to capture international attention.
“Spanish is spoken here,” “Mexico for Mexicans,” and, “Go home,” read three of the screeds.
Social media couldn’t get enough of the disorderly protests – with the familiar masked vandals infiltrating yet another march and smashing up storefronts. The Mexico City police were curiously absent. An easy narrative of Americans abroad wearing out their welcome, while ICE cruelly rounded up Mexican migrants in cities such as Los Angeles.
The Department of Homeland Security jumped in with its own snark, posting, “Oh,” above an X Post with protester graffitiing the words, “Not your home,” and a protester waving a sign in English admonishing, “Pay taxes, learn Spanish, respect my culture.
Much of the international media, meanwhile, focused on the core matter of gentrification, which has spread through leafy neighbourhoods such as Roma, Condesa and Juárez – among others – over the past 15 years, driving up rents and forcing some long-term residents to move as their homes became short-term rentals.
The easy hook for any story on gentrification are…