A Troubled Relationship (I)

Beyond parties or ideological positions, Claudia Sheinbaum’s incoming government will face a difficult task: rebuilding the Mexican side of the relationship with the United States if it wishes to go beyond mutual necessity and bare minimums.

Certainly, the issue is not just on Mexico’s side. The incoming U.S. government, beginning in January, will also need to take steps to meet the Mexican government halfway, beyond political promises and dissonant campaign arguments.

It’s true that both countries need each other, but it’s also true that the relationship is currently strained. If this tension continues, it could potentially regress the bilateral relationship by a century.

In recent days, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has effectively put the relationship on hold, not just with the U.S. embassy, but with the U.S. government as a whole, following comments made by Ambassador Ken Salazar regarding judicial reform, which López Obrador himself promoted.

Additionally, there was an incident involving drug lord Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, who was allegedly kidnapped and taken to the United States by the “Chapitos” cartel, supposedly in exchange for leniency toward their detained relatives.

The Mexican government has complained of improper interference, and the president has blamed this alleged U.S. intervention for the recent violence in Culiacán.

President López Obrador’s accusations have been met with a formal institutional response from the U.S. government, which is in the midst of an election cycle and facing unprecedented political uncertainty in decades.

But these claims are being noted. The judicial reform, for instance, is unofficially seen in the U.S. as a violation of the spirit, if not the letter, of the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Trade Agreement (USMCA), which is set to be reviewed in 2026. Some analysts suggest that both the U.S. and Canada believe the reform aims to protect certain sectors of the Mexican economy, at the expense of investors from those countries, thus paving the way for a difficult renegotiation.

From the Mexican perspective, this is an expression of sovereign rights and a rejection of foreign interference. The fact is, these viewpoints seem politically and ideologically opposed.

Adding to this is a geopolitical dimension where the U.S. views Mexico’s strong commercial relationship with China — disadvantageous for Mexico — and, to some extent, Russia’s presence in Mexico with distrust.

What’s at stake is a relationship where Mexico heavily relies on massive trade with the U.S. and Canada. For the U.S., it affects its strategy of consolidating regional production and trade processes to foster its own growth.

BY JOSÉ CARREÑO FIGUERAS

ContributorJOSE.CARRENO@ELHERALDODEMEXICO.COM

@CARRENOJOSE1

Contenido originalmente publicado en El Heraldo de México.