Five ways Mexico could get tough on us: Elvia Díaz

Historically, Mexico hasn’t had a fighting chance against the United States — not militarily anyway. But our neighbor to the south has other weapons in its arsenal to retaliate against President Trump’s provocations.

In the blind pursuit against all things Mexican, the U.S. is underestimating the plausible revolt that’s shaping up south of the border and on American soil.

Sure, it’s not a riotous display of defiance, not yet. It’s a sustained nationalist movement by people fed up with Trump’s fixation on humiliating their country.

Mexican government officials have begun talking tougher against the United States, while prominent leaders are laying the foundation for their attack. And the weapons available to them are us, the American people. Yes, Mexico’s strategy to fight Trump is designed to use our court systems, our drug addictions, our food products and services.

How exactly would that strategy unfold? Here are five ways:

Clog immigration courts. Trump’s directives targeting the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants, many of them from Mexico, has them terrified. Further hitting Mexico in the gut, the president wants to dump deportees on Mexican soil regardless of their country of origin.

Mexico won’t accept non-Mexican deportees and has begun financing legal aid for nationals in the United States. Mexico’s government has sent roughly $50 million to Mexican consulates for that purpose.

From his end, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, the leading presidential contender in Mexico’s 2018 election, plans to unveil a legal team of 100 lawyers to help Mexican nationals with deportation proceedings.

Lopez Obrador is the head of the leftist MORENA movement and is touring several U.S. cities, including Phoenix last week, to tout among other things his strategy to choke U.S. immigration courts to delay deportations. Mexican senators, too, voiced a similar strategy during their recent Phoenix visit.

Who'll be financing the legal team is sketchy, but aides to Lopez Obrador tell me he’ll soon offer more details.

Fight a trade war over tortillas. There is growing movement in the Mexican Senate to boycott or stop importing corn from the USA. Corn is symbolically important because indigenous people of Mexico domesticated the grain plant.

Paste BN reported that Mexican Sen. Armando Rios Piter is seeking legislation to require Mexico to stop buying corn from the United States and to buy instead from Brazil and Argentina. But why stop with the $2 billion annual corn exports?

In 2015, U.S. agricultural exports to Mexico reached $17.7 billion, including other products such as soybeans, dairy, pork and beef, according to the Department of Agriculture.

Those exports are tariffs-free under the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement among the U.S., Mexico and Canada, which the White House wants to renegotiate or end to rebuke Mexico.

Mexico could stop buying all agriculture products. Should that occur, either the American people would have to consume $2 billion worth of corn tortillas, or farmers would suffer the consequences.

Look elsewhere for trading partners. Already, Mexico is looking to Asia for trading partners. And that is on top of talks reportedly underway with Argentina and Brazil to export corn. Analysts suggest the United States offers a better deal, but Mexicans might be willing to pay the higher price if necessary.

Mexico and Canada buy more U.S. goods and services than any other country, according to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative.

Undoubtedly, ending NAFTA would devastate Mexico and cost hundreds of thousands of U.S. jobs. But Mexican pride is deeply wounded, and Mexico could be the one to walk away from that trade agreement.

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Mexico’s proximity to the USA makes it ideal to trade, but trading with Asia and other regions to replace the United States is certainly viable.

Slap us with high tariffs. Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray and other officials are warning they could impose taxes on selected goods the United States is most dependent. Videgaray has yet to offer concrete examples of the taxable goods, but he told news outlets that Texas, Iowa and Wisconsin are target states. The three states are exporters of agricultural and other goods and services. Iowa's largest export markets include Mexico, Canada and Japan, so it makes sense for Mexico to target the state.

Trump suggested slapping Mexico with a 20% tariff to pay for a wall along the 2,000-mile shared border. So Mexico can and should consider doing the same.

Make us fight drugs alone. The United States is facing an epidemic of opioid and opiate addiction. The habit of narcotic painkillers overprescribed by doctors often leads to heroin use. And guess where most heroin comes from? You guessed it. Most of the drugs on America's streets and in American homes come across the Mexican border, according to various reports. The lucrative drug-trafficking business requires extensive distribution networks and sophisticated money-laundering operations. Mexico could shut the United States out of intelligence information, leaving it to fight drug trafficking alone. The result could be an uptick of illicit drugs and overdoses.

This is no laughing matter, but why wouldn’t Mexico consider using it against Trump?

Elvia Diaz is an editorial columnist for The Arizona Republic, where this column first appeared. Follow her on Twitter: @elviadiaz1

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