In what looks like a case of “he said, she said,” President-elect Donald Trump and Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum appear to have starkly different recollections of a conversation that covered the hot-button issue of migration.
After the phone chat late Wednesday, Trump wrote on social media that the Mexican leader had agreed to stop immigration through Mexico and to the United States.
“Just had a wonderful conversation with the new President of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo. She has agreed to stop Migration through Mexico, and into the United States, effectively closing our Southern Border,” he said in a post on Truth Social. “It was a very productive conversation!”
Sheinbaum’s account differed from Trump’s.
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“In our conversation with President Trump, I explained to him the comprehensive strategy that Mexico has followed to address the migration phenomenon, respecting human rights,” she said on X. “We reiterate that Mexico’s position is not to close borders but instead build bridges between government and people.”
En nuestra conversación con el presidente Trump, le expuse la estrategia integral que ha seguido México para atender el fenómeno migratorio, respetando los derechos humanos. Gracias a ello se atiende a las personas migrantes y a las caravanas previo a que lleguen a la frontera.…
— Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo (@Claudiashein) November 28, 2024
Earlier, Sheinbaum said she’d had an “excellent conversation with President Donald Trump.”
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“I shared with him that caravans weren’t arriving at the northern border because they are being served in Mexico,” she said in the post, referring the large groups of migrants traveling together in hopes of reaching the U.S.
The phone call between the two leaders came just days after Trump said his incoming administration would place new tariffs on imported goods from Mexico, Canada and China from Jan. 20.
Trump said in a post on Truth Social on Monday that he plans to “charge Mexico and Canada a 25% Tariff on ALL products” imported into the U.S., framing the proposal as a response to the ongoing fentanyl crisis.
Trump said the tariff will remain until “Drugs, in particular Fentanyl and all Illegal Aliens stop this Invasion of our Country!”
The Mexican president sent a letter to Trump on Tuesday responding to the proposed tariffs, emphasizing the need for “cooperation and mutual understanding” to tackle these challenges. Drug use “cannot be addressed through threats or tariffs,” she said, according to a translation of the letter from the Mexican Embassy.
Sheinbaum, a physicist and climate scientist who was elected earlier this year, is a member of Mexico’s leftist Morena party, which was founded by her mentor and predecessor, Andrés Manuel López Obrador.
Sheinbaum vowed to carry on López Obrador’s biggest pledges, such as combating the country’s high levels of violence by continuing his “hugs, not bullets” policy of not directly taking on criminal organizations that have gained control over large parts of Mexico as they fight for territory to traffic drugs into the U.S., make money from migrant smuggling and extort residents to fuel their illicit enterprises.
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