As Colombia ends its immigration standoff with Trump, Mexico looks eager to avoid a clash

WASHINGTON —  President Trump’s tariff threats to pressure Colombian President Gustavo Petro to accept U.S. deportation flights served as a warning to the entire region.

But while Petro attempted to stand up to Trump — with only mixed results — Mexico, the country most affected by U.S. policy on migration, appears to be playing it safer.

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum on Monday said her government is continuing to receive U.S. flights full of deportees, and is accepting a small number from third countries.

“The relationship with the United States is special,” Sheinbaum told reporters. “We are obliged to have a good relationship.”

Administration officials trumpeted their success so far in pressing other nations to accept deportees. But leaders from Latin American countries point out that they have been allowing hundreds of such flights to land for many years.

The stakes vary country to country. Colombia is a minor trade partner with the U.S., and not a major supplier of migrants.

The impasse between the United States and Colombia over deportation flights ended after a day of threats and counter-threats.

Petro early Sunday turned back two U.S. military flights carrying deportees as part of Trump’s plan to expel millions of migrants. Petro said he would receive deportees but only under “dignified conditions.”

In response, Trump said he was ordering a 25% tariff on all Colombian exports to the U.S., rising to 50% in a week if flights were not resumed. Trump also threatened a raft of visa restrictions and other financial punishment.

The two sides rushed into late-night negotiations. Late Sunday, they agreed to a series of conditions and said the flights would resume. The White House said Petro had accepted all of Trump’s terms. Colombia said it had received assurances of the “dignified conditions” that Petro had demanded.

For Trump, the episode gave him a chance to show the rest of Latin America the risks they face if they do not fall in line with his deportation plan.

The stakes are higher for Mexico, the United States’ largest trade partner and the largest single source country for migrants who cross the U.S. border without legal authorization.

Sheinbaum has studiously avoided conflict with Trump. Unlike Petro or her predecessor, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, Sheinbaum has been matter-of-fact about Mexico’s willingness to cooperate with the U.S. on issues of migration.

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It’s a stance, she points out, that is not new.

At her daily news conference, Sheinbaum said Mexico had received some 4,000 migrants deported from the United States in the days since Trump’s inauguration, a number of deportations that she said was about average.

Sheinbaum opted to stay out of the fray in Colombia’s conflict with the U.S., despite her clear ideological affinity with Petro, a fellow leftist.

Instead, Sheinbaum insisted on the importance for Mexico of maintaining good relations with the U.S.

She lauded the fact that Mexico and Colombia had come to an agreement.

“The important thing, I said from Day 1, is to always act with a cool head, defending the sovereignty of each country and respect between nations and peoples,” Sheinbaum said.

Significantly, she suggested some of those deportees were not Mexican.

The issue of whether Mexico should accept migrants from “third countries” has been a major point of negotiation between the U.S. and its neighbor to the south. During Trump’s first term, asylum-seekers from a variety of countries who had crossed the U.S. border were forced to return to Mexico until they were allowed entry to the U.S. for their hearings.

Sheinbaum suggested that Mexico might repatriate some of the non-Mexican migrants to their native countries.

“We would seek mechanisms through migration policy and foreign policy for returning people to their countries of origin,” she said. She said that Mexico would negotiate with the United States over who would foot the bill for those repatriations.

Taking in third-country deportees is particularly controversial.

Stephanie Brewer, the director for Mexico at the Washington Office on Latin America, a human rights advocacy group, said Mexico’s decision to receive deportees from other countries was disappointing.

“It’s unfortunate, because policies are being normalized that are absolutely abnormal,” Brewer said. “A big priority driving the recent actions is the public relations and the public messaging part of it and broadcasting this message of, ‘Look at all the people we’re deporting on military planes.’”

The brief drama with Colombia was a reminder, she said, that Trump “will very quickly resort to threats when it comes to forcing other countries to cooperate.” Yet meanwhile, she said, real lives hang in the balance.

“These Mexican non-nationals have become bargaining chips in the bilateral relationship, where both sides negotiate how many people Mexico accepts, which nationalities, and the format of returns,” she said. “That comes at a cost of human families and individuals who are seeking protection.”