Mexico says no to Trump's new deportation rules

MEXICO CITY — Mexico will vigorously fight U.S. mass deportations of undocumented immigrants back to Mexico and refuse to accept any non-Mexicans expelled across the border, Mexican Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray vowed Wednesday.

A day after the Trump administration unveiled tough new guidelines for enforcing immigration laws, Videgaray said the treatment of Mexican migrants in the United States would top his country's agenda when President Enrique Peña Nieto meets Thursday with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly.

“I want to make clear, in the most emphatic way, that the government of Mexico and the Mexican people do not have to accept measures that, in a unilateral way, one government wants to impose on another,” Videgary said.

He added that Mexico would go to the United Nations to defend the rights of its migrants. “We are not going to accept it because we don’t have to accept it and because it is not in the interests of Mexico,” he said.

The Department of Homeland Security said its new directives focus on criminals and those who pose a threat to the U.S., but the provisions expand the authority of federal agents to deport the vast majority of the 11 million undocumented immigrants living in the United States.

Under the new rules, all federal immigration officers can now conduct an "expedited removal" anywhere in the U.S. against people who arrived in the U.S. in the previous two years.

One critical provision, which requires Mexico's cooperation, allows federal agents to send people back to Mexico, even if they're not from that country. Many recent arrivals to the U.S. came from Central America, traveling through Mexico.

The latest dispute threatens to further damage already strained U.S.-Mexico relations, which deteriorated as President Trump promised to build a wall along the border wall at Mexico's expense and to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) that he said has unfairly benefited Mexico.

In Washington, White House spokesman Sean Spicer said the U.S. and Mexico "have a very healthy and robust relationship."

"I think they would echo that same sentiment," Spicer said. "I think the relationship with Mexico is phenomenal right now. I believe there’s an unbelievable and robust dialogue between our two nations.”

READ MORE:

Foreign policy analysts here said the Mexican government faces a tough balancing act between diplomacy with Trump to achieve a good outcome and standing up to the new president.

“The aggressions have been constant and (Mexico) is staying silent so they don’t anger the United States,” said Brenda Estefan, a Mexican foreign policy analyst. “They’re trying not to be incendiary or combative, but if someone is attacking you, you have to defend yourself.”

Trump signed an executive order in late January, ordering construction of a border wall — just as Videgaray and the country’s economy minister had started high-level talks in Washington. Peña Nieto canceled a trip to Washington scheduled for Jan. 31 after Trump tweeted that it would be best to stay home if Mexico refused to discuss paying for the wall.

Read more:

“Mexico is blindsided every week by the Trump administration,” said Esteban Illades, editor of the Mexican magazine Nexos. “Every time they’re about to reach an agreement, Trump changes the rules. The Mexican government keeps falling for the strategy, because deep down they still think that Trump is a rational person, which he has proven time and time again he’s not.”

Andrés Rozental, a former Mexican ambassador, said that if the U.S. "wants more of a wall, it is their right to do so, but it’s aggressive and insulting" to insist that Mexico pay for it, something Peña Nieto said he won't do.

The current friction follows increased cooperation between the two countries in recent years. The U.S. provides financial, technical and intelligence assistance in Mexico’s decade-long crackdown on drug cartels. For its part, Mexico has detained and deported more than 300,000 Central Americans since July 2014, when it started an initiative to secure its southern border.

Although Trump has touted an expanded border wall as a way to stop migrants from entering the U.S. illegally, population estimates show more Mexicans are returning home than heading north.

NAFTA has been a boon for Mexico’s economy, expanding exports to the U.S. and boosting wages of Mexican workers. Trump, however, contends the accord has encouraged a flight of U.S. factories and jobs across the border, where wages are still much lower.

“There’s no package we could put together that would satisfy (Trump’s) inordinate hunger for dumping us,” said Federico Estévez, political science professor at the Autonomous Technological Institute of Mexico. He added in jest, “Maybe they could give him the rest of the California Peninsula.”