WASHINGTON – On Sunday, President Donald Trump shared that Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum turned down his suggestion to deploy U.S. troops in Mexico to combat the illegal drug trade, citing her fear of the country’s influential cartels.
Trump made these remarks a day after Sheinbaum stated that he had urged her during a phone call the previous month to allow greater U.S. military involvement in fighting drug cartels within Mexico.
Trump said it was “true” that he proposed sending the troops to Mexico and lashed into Sheinbaum for dismissing the idea.
“Well, she’s so terrified of the cartels she can’t even walk properly, which is understandable,” Trump mentioned to reporters on Air Force One on Sunday. “I consider her a wonderful person. The President of Mexico is a wonderful woman, but her fear of the cartels is so intense that she can’t think clearly.”
The U.S. military presence along the southern border with Mexico has increased steadily in recent months, following Trump’s order in January to increase the army’s role in stemming the flow of migrants.
The U.S. Northern Command has surged troops and equipment to the border, increased manned surveillance flights to monitor fentanyl trafficking along the border and sought expanded authority for U.S. Special Forces to work closely with Mexican forces conducting operations against cartels.
But Sheinbaum said that U.S. troops operating inside Mexico was going too far.
“We can work together, but you in your territory and us in ours,” Sheinbaum said she told Trump.
Trump in February designated as “foreign terrorist organizations” many gangs and cartels smuggling drugs into the U.S. , restricting their movements and lending law enforcement more resources to act against them.
But Sheinbaum’s stance — and Trump’s response — suggest that U.S. pressure for unilateral military intervention could create tension between the two leaders after cooperation on immigration and trade in the early going of Trump’s second term.
Trump said the U.S. military is needed to stem the scourge of fentanyl in the United States.
“They are bad news,” Trump said of the cartels. “If Mexico wanted help with the cartels we would be honored to go in and do it. I told her that. I would be honored to go in and do it. The cartels are trying to destroy our country.”
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