President Trump has been threatening to impose tariffs on Mexico if the nation fails to stop the flow of foreigners to the U.S. border.
Seems like the threats are starting to work.
Mexico on Wednesday dispatched a special unit made up of 200 military police, immigration agents and federal officers to cut off a group of more than 1,000 migrants from Central America outside the town of Metapa to confront the caravan. State and local police accompanied the team.
“While the vast majority of the migrants complied with law enforcement directives and boarded buses and immigration agency vehicles, some resisted and were wrestled to the ground by unarmed agents,” the Daily Mail wrote.
An immigration official at the site who was not authorized to speak publicly said the migrants would initially be taken to an immigration detention center in Tapachula. It appeared 600 to 800 migrants were being transported.
Mexico’s effort to curtail the constant flow of Central American migrants from its southern border with Guatemala was its latest response to threats from President Trump, who has promised to impose high tariffs on America’s southern neighbor if it fails to put an end to illegal immigration. …
Frustrated by the lack of progress on a signature issue from his 2016 election campaign, Trump unexpectedly told Mexico last week to take a harder line on curbing illegal immigration or face five percent tariffs on all its exports to the United States, rising to as much as 25 percent later in the year.
On Thursday, Trump — who was in France to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the D-Day invasion — once again warned Mexico that it needs to “step up to the plate” to stem the flow of migrants to the U.S. border or face tariffs.
“Mexico has been making, for many, many years, hundreds of mill- — of billions of dollars,” Trump said. “They’ve been making an absolute fortune on the United States. They have to step up, and they have to step up to the plate, and perhaps they will. We’re going to see. They can solve the problem.”
The president also blames Democrats in Congress for failing to secure the border.
“The Democrats — Congress has been a disaster. They won’t change. They won’t do anything. They want free immigration — immigration to pour into our country. They don’t care who it is. They don’t care what kind of a record they have. It doesn’t make any difference. They’re not going to be changing anything. We go to them, we say, ‘Let’s fix the immigration laws.’ They just want it to do badly. The worse it does, the happier they are.
“So that’s the way it is, and, I guess, that’s the way it’ll be until after the election. It’s a disgrace. Because, frankly, we could solve this problem so easy if the Democrats in Congress were willing to make some changes, but they’re not. And that’s the way it is. They want to just ride it out. They want to have a real bad time. They don’t care about crime. They don’t care about drugs pouring into our country. They couldn’t care less. It’s all politics. It’s a vicious business. So that’s the way it is,” Trump said.
The president also said tariffs will be an effective incentive for Mexico to take action.
“When you have the money, when you have the product, when you have the thing that everybody wants, you’re in a position to do very well with tariffs, and that’s where we are. We’re the piggybank. The United States is the piggybank. It has all the money that others want to take from us, but they’re not taking it so easy anymore. It’s a lot different,” Trump said.
Talks between U.S. and Mexican officials continue in Washington, but Trump warned that “Something pretty dramatic could happen with Mexico, the tariffs go on — and I mean it, too. And I’m very happy with it. I think a lot of progress was made yesterday, but we have to make a lot of progress.”
