Among large swaths of Republican voters, it is a truth universally acknowledged that the next President of the United States must enhance border security between the US and Mexico to keep illegal immigrants from entering the country and to protect American jobs. Perhaps the most pervasive of these policy proposals is Donald Trump’s monolithic response to immigration control: we’re gonna build a wall, and Mexico’s gonna pay for it. While crowds of supporters enthusiastically echo Trump’s wall demands at his rallies, the spread of their anti-Mexican rhetoric threatens US foreign relations with its neighbor, and consequently, threatens the future of the US economy and national security.
Though the specifics of his plan remain unclear, Trump asserts that his $10 million wall, measuring around 35 feet tall (and ‘it just got ten feet higher’) would impede the flow of alleged criminal activity from Mexico to the United States. With the Patriot Act serving as his legal framework, Trump claims he has the ‘moral high ground’ to impose stricter border regulation at Mexico’s expense; not only does Mexico’s ‘unfair subsidy behavior’ threaten US jobs, Mexico has an obligation to offset the “extraordinary daily cost of this criminal activity, including the cost of trials and incarcerations.”
Citing the US’s powerful economy and political dominance as coercive tools, Trump assures that Mexico will pay for the cost of a border wall “in one form or another,” through economic sanctions, trade tariffs, and/or greater trade regulation. According to the platform on Trump’s campaign website, “Mexico needs access to our markets much more than the reverse, so we have all the leverage and will win the negotiation.” As Trump pushes his characterization of Mexico as a country of “cunning” criminals who take advantage of the US’s economy, he builds an isolationist discourse that ignores the value of our international relations and paints the US as a self-sufficient hegemon that can bully its neighbors into any position that suits it.
In response, however, past and present Mexican leaders have reassured their constituents that Mexico will not bend so easily to Trump’s will. In an interview with Excelsior, current Mexican President, Peña Nieto, likened Trump’s anti-immigrant rhetoric to the fascist mechanisms of Mussolini and Hitler, warning that his unrealistic political strategy presents “simple solutions to problems that, of course, are not so easily solved.” Acknowledging that trade relations with the US are vital to the Mexican economy, Peña Nieto expressed hope to continue cooperation with the future president, whoever he or she may be. Nonetheless, the Mexican government firmly maintains that Trump’s border wall will not be constructed with any support, financial or otherwise, from Mexico.
Regardless of the feasibility of Trump’s prospective wall, his anti-Mexico platform gravely threatens the US’s relationship with an important regional ally. The North American Free Trade Agreement, NAFTA, has been instrumental in promoting economic growth and development throughout Mexico, Canada, and the US. Since its beginnings in 1994, NAFTA has strengthened interactions between the US and its neighbors; through the arrangement’s framework, the three nations have instituted mechanisms to facilitate intergovernmental relations and forums for dispute resolution. Though the tripartisan trade agreement is entrenched with asymmetrical power divisions between the three partners – as studies demonstrate the US influencing policy decisions in Canada and Mexico without the reverse occurring – the United States economy has enjoyed significant benefits from NAFTA, and a fair amount of its success is pinned to the agreement’s success.
Currently, Mexico is the US’s third largest goods trading partner, the second largest export market, and third largest supplier of goods imports – in 2015, total goods traded between the two nations amounted to $531 billion. Moreover, the Department of Commerce estimates US goods and services to Mexico supported 1.1 million American jobs in 2014. Since creating stronger economic ties with the United States, Mexico’s economy has transformed into a new level of competitiveness. While the Mexican economy felt some pressure from lowered oil prices and reduced production, its expansion of exports to the United States encouraged economic growth in 2015. Projections of Mexico’s financial future also appear positive; if Mexico continues to develop close economic relations with the US, the World Bank forecasts a gradual acceleration of growth in coming years.
Furthermore, communities along the US-Mexico border comprise the fourth largest economy in the world, and in order to encourage greater development in this region both governments must coordinate their local and national economic policies. To build upon the region’s strengths, US perceptions of the border area must transform to recognize its potential as an asset rather than a problem. Successful interaction on either side demands a more developed cross border infrastructure – not to divide and separate, but to create more windows for international exchange. By continuing to support Mexico’s growth and development, the US helps make North America more competitive on a global scale, which in turn benefits its own economic situation. Despite Trump’s populist rhetoric, investments from the US to Mexico are more than one-sided aid packages – the US stands to benefit from stronger relations with its southern neighbor.
Additionally, the existing economic ties between the two countries have helped reinforce their diplomatic relationship, especially in addressing similar security concerns like drug related violence and illegal immigration. Through programs like the Merida project, the US has assisted the Mexican government scrutinize law enforcement and institutionalize rule of law south of the border. While this program enjoyed limited successes, it serves as a starting point for further cooperation in the fight against drug related violence. In her article, US and Mexican Cooperation: The Merida Initiative and Drug Trafficking, Yasemin Tenkin argues the US could more effectively eradicate root causes of the illicit drug trade and drug related violence by investing further in Mexico’s economy, targeting poverty and unemployment. To address these security concerns, the US’s conceptualization of Mexico must shift to recognize it as a permanent, strategic partnership. Contrarily, Trump’s isolationist discourse suggests the US renounce its links to Mexico, questioning the benefits the US receives from the asymmetrical relationship.
The increasingly populist tone of bilateral relations between the US and Mexico has led to tension in the past decade, occasionally putting a strain on diplomatic decision-making; as such, a Donald Trump presidency would place bilateral relations between the two nations at risk of severe deterioration. From Trump’s perspective, the US enjoys a hegemonic status in the sphere of foreign affairs, and may wield its political power for leverage in its international relations. What Trump’s rhetoric fails to recognize, though, is that his brand of isolationism is ineffective in today’s globalized reality. In order to achieve progress in shared policy areas such as immigration reform or weakening the drug trade system, the US must maintain a working partnership with Mexico. If Trump were to stifle the Mexican economy’s growth and cut off remittances, as he proposes, the consequential loss of income for Mexico’s vulnerable population would provide prospective immigrants an increased incentive to seek better opportunities in the US; by ignoring the role of American consumers in perpetuating the influx of illicit drugs, and failing to coordinate policy with Mexico, the US can do little to address long term solutions to cross border dealings.
By promoting a characterization of Mexico as a dependent, underdeveloped, and violent country, Trump and his supporters disregard the value of Mexico’s growing economy, and hence fail to recognize the benefits of the US’s partnership with Mexico. Without cooperation and coordination between the two countries, the US would suffer the loss of a significant trade partner and destroy myriad opportunities for economic growth and employment, weakening North American competitiveness in the global market. In regards to national security, Trump’s failure to recognize Mexico’s potential as a cooperative, problem solving partner rather than the source of conflict weakens the US’s ability to create far-reaching policy solutions to stabilize the border. So who’s gonna pay for that wall, Mr. Trump? Looking at the likely economic and political future of a US without strong bilateral relations with Mexico, it looks like the United States stand to bear more costs than the presidential hopeful may have foreseen.