How to understand this relative “popularity” of Donald Trump among opposition Mexicans? Last week, in his column The Financier, Leopoldo Gomez He risked a hypothesis: “for an important segment of the population, Trump is seen as the only real containment in the face of unlimited power in Mexico.” It makes sense. Last week I participated in a Space in which a woman asked me, just like that, if Donald Trump could end up being the “counterweight”, even from outside, that the Mexican government does not have within the national territory. I replied that I don’t think so.
One, because it is not the same. One thing is a counterweight (a power that has explicit powers to limit the actions of another as part of a constitutional system of balance of powers) and another thing is a foreign power (a country that can exert influence, pressure or retaliation to impose their priorities to another).
Two, because Trump will hardly have a pro-democracy agenda in foreign policy. It is unlikely that your government is going to promote the holding of free and fair elections, respect for human rights, the defense of freedom of expression, etc., when what it represents – both domestically and internationally – is not the culture of “rule of law” but, rather, of “law and order” (not “rule of law”, then, but “iron fist”).
And three, because the interests of Trump and his coalition have nothing to do with the national interests of Mexico. That tariffs, deportations or US operations against organized crime in Mexican territory make life impossible for the Sheinbaum government does not mean that they are good for our country: not everything that is good for the Sheinbaum government is good For Mexico, it is true, but that does not imply that everything that is bad for the Sheinbaum government is good for Mexico.
The survey of TResearch International It shows, however, that for the population that does not agree with Sheinbaum these distinctions do not matter much. Regarding the possibility of the United States establishing higher tariffs for Mexican products, 37% see it well. Regarding the possibility of the United States carrying out mass deportations of immigrants, 51% are in favor. And regarding the possibility of the United States taking action against drug traffickers in Mexico, 88% approve. The vast majority of those who agree with Sheinbaum, in contrast, take a dim view of these three possibilities: 88%, 90% and 74%, respectively.
