President Donald Trump announced Friday he suspended plans to impose tariffs on Mexico after reaching an agreement with that country to “significantly reduce or eliminate” the migratory flow.
“Tariffs scheduled to go into effect on Monday against Mexico are suspended indefinitely, and Mexico has agreed in exchange to take forceful measures to stop the migratory tide through Mexico towards our southern border,” Trump announced on Twitter.
We do this, he added, to reduce considerably, or eliminate, the illegal immigration that comes from Mexico to the United States.
The tariffs, which affected all imports from Mexico, were going to go into effect on Monday at 5%, a rate that would gradually increase month by month until reaching 25% by October unless the Government of Andrés Manuel López Obrador managed to stop the growing migratory flow at the border.
Trump did not give details of the agreement reached today with Mexico, but indicated that the State Department will do so soon.
After meeting last Friday the decision to impose tariffs, Lopez Obrador sent his foreign minister, Marcelo Ebrard, to Washington, at the head of a delegation that has negotiated the agreement with American officials all week.
This Thursday, Mexico undertook to send 6,000 troops from its National Guard to its southern border with Guatemala, a point on which much of the current migratory flow, made up mostly of Central Americans, crosses to head towards the United States.
The United States stopped more than 132,000 immigrants in May on its southern border, 30% more than in April and the highest figure recorded in a single month since 2006.
