United States President Donald Trump asserted Tuesday that Mexico is “dominated entirely by criminal cartels” and declared that the U.S. is waging a war on cartels.
In a speech to a joint session of the United States Congress that lasted more than 100 minutes, Trump also took aim at Mexico for allowing “fentanyl to come into our country at levels never seen before.”
“My fellow Americans, get ready for an incredible future-because the Golden Age of America has only JUST BEGUN.” – President Donald J. Trump 🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/Ddm8AzmqY9
— President Donald J. Trump (@POTUS) March 5, 2025
His speech came the same day that 25% tariffs on Mexican exports to the United States took effect, and less than two weeks after the U.S. government designated six Mexican cartels as foreign terrorist organizations.
A selection of Trump’s Mexico-related remarks, and an assessment of their veracity, appears below.
“The territory to the immediate south of our border is now dominated entirely by criminal cartels that murder, rape, torture and exercise total control. They have total control over a whole nation, posing a grave threat to our national security.”
Trump’s assertion that cartels have “total control” over Mexico is blatant hyperbole.
Mexico certainly has a cartel problem — and those criminal organizations commit heinous crimes and have significant influence, including over politicians in some cases.
But cartels do not “exercise total control” in the “territory to the immediate south” of the United States’ border.
Trump’s assertion goes much further than a claim in 2021 by the then-commander of the United States Northern Command.
General Glen D. VanHerck said in March 2021 that “transnational criminal organizations” operate “oftentimes in ungoverned areas” that account for “30% to 35% of Mexico.”
Former president Andrés Manuel López Obrador rejected that claim.
Trump’s claim that cartels pose a “grave threat” to the United States’ national security is reminiscent of former Drug Enforcement Administration chief Anne Milgram’s assertion that the Sinaloa Cartel and the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) pose “the greatest criminal threat the United States has ever faced.”
To support his “grave threat” claim, Trump could point to the fact that six Mexican cartels are now designated as terrorist organizations in the United States.
He highlighted on Tuesday night that those cartels “are now officially in the same category as ISIS.”
“The cartels are waging war in America, and it’s time for America to wage war on the cartels, which we are doing.”
Trump’s claim that cartels are “waging war in America” was an apparent reference to the large number of fentanyl-related overdose deaths in the United States in recent years.
Mexican cartels are major suppliers of illicit fentanyl to the United States. They manufacture the powerful synthetic opioid with Chinese precursor chemicals smuggled into Mexico at Pacific coast ports.
Trump could point to a range of United States’ actions to support his claim that the United States is waging war on cartels.
They include:
- The designation of six Mexican cartels as foreign terrorist organizations.
- The use of CIA drones to spy on cartels and hunt for clandestine drug labs.
- The imposition of tariffs on Mexican exports to pressure Mexico to do more to combat drug cartels and fentanyl trafficking.
On the first day of his second term, when asked whether he would consider “ordering U.S. special forces into Mexico” to “take out” cartels, Trump responded “could happen.”
“Stranger things have happened,” said the president, who last year indicated he was open to using military “strikes” against Mexican cartels.
If the United States were to use military force against cartels on Mexican soil (perhaps not as unlikely as it seems), Trump’s assertion that the U.S. is waging war against such criminal organizations would become even more emphatic — and more accurate in a pure semantic sense.
In turn, the United States’ relationship with Mexico would become even more complicated and strained.
“Illegal border crossings last month were by far the lowest ever recorded ever.”
This statement is true, based on arrests of migrants at the United States southern border.
As Reuters notes, “migrant arrests are often used as a proxy to estimate illegal crossings although some migrants also enter undetected.”
Tonight, President Trump laid out his vision to renew the American dream. In just a few short weeks, President Trump’s immigration and border security policies have led to an all-time-low in illegal crossings at the southern border. The message is clear: America’s borders are… pic.twitter.com/tAcPStsArG
— Secretary Kristi Noem (@Sec_Noem) March 5, 2025
The White House said in a statement on Tuesday that “in February — President Trump’s first month in office — illegal border crossings fell to the lowest level ever recorded, down 94% from last February and down 96% from the all-time high of the Biden Administration.”
News outlets including Reuters and Axios have reported that migrant arrests at the southern border fell to their lowest monthly level on record in February.
“Encounters” between migrants and United States authorities at the Mexico-U.S. border began falling last year after former president Joe Biden implemented a new border policy.
“Much has been said over the last three months about Mexico and Canada. But we have very large deficits with both of them. But even more importantly, they have allowed fentanyl to come into our country at levels never seen before, killing hundreds of thousands of our citizens and many very young, beautiful people, destroying families. Nobody’s ever seen anything like it. They are in effect receiving subsidies of hundreds of billions of dollars. We pay subsidies to Canada and to Mexico of hundreds of billions of dollars. And the United States will not be doing that any longer.”
The United States does indeed have a large trade deficit with Mexico — a record-high US $171.8 billion in 2024.
Trump has cited trade deficits with Mexico and Canada as one reason for his decision to impose tariffs on the United States’ largest trade partners.
However, his main stated reason for imposing tariffs on Mexican and Canadian imports on Tuesday is that fentanyl — as he said Tuesday night — is entering the United States “at levels never seen before” and killing hundreds of thousands of people.
As migrant arrests can be used as a proxy to estimate illegal border crossings, fentanyl seizures can be as used as a proxy to estimate whether the amount of the opioid entering the United States is going up or down.
United States border authorities seized 9,928 kilograms (21,889 pounds) of fentanyl in the 2024 fiscal year, down from over 12,200 kilograms (27,000 pounds) in fiscal year 2023.
According to U.S. Customs and Border Protection, “CBP has caught more fentanyl nationwide in fiscal years 2023 and 2024 than ever before in history.”
Therefore, Trump’s assertion that a record amount of fentanyl is entering the United States from Mexico can be considered true. It is also true that hundreds of thousands of people have died in recent years due to fentanyl overdoses.
“[We will] complete the largest deportation operation in American history, larger even than current record-holder President Dwight D. Eisenhower.”Â
It remains to be seen whether this will happen during the second Trump administration.
So far, the Trump administration “has struggled to increase deportation levels even as it has opened up new pathways to deport migrants of other nationalities to Mexico and Central America,” Reuters reported Wednesday.
“Trump deported 37,660 people during his first month in office, … far less than the monthly average of 57,000 removals and returns in the last full year of Biden’s administration,” the news agency said.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum reported on Monday that Mexico had received almost 20,000 deportees from the United States since Trump took office on Jan. 20.
The Mexican government developed a program called “México te abraza” (Mexico embraces you) to support people deported from the United States during the Trump administration.
“Five nights ago, Mexican authorities, because of our tariff policies being imposed on them, think of this, handed over to us 29 of the biggest cartel leaders in their country. That has never happened before. They want to make us happy. First time ever. But we need Mexico and Canada to do much more than they’ve done, and they have to stop the fentanyl and drugs pouring into the U.S.A.”
Mexico extradited 29 drug cartel figures including notorious drug lord Rafael Caro Quintero to the United States last Thursday. The extraditions were indeed, as NPR reported, an “unprecedented show of security cooperation.”
Whether Mexico extradited the 29 individuals due to the United States’ “tariff policies” is possible, even likely, but not certain. The 25% tariffs on Mexican exports that are currently in effect were not in force when the extraditions occurred.
Mexico’s Security Ministry and the Federal Attorney General’s Office said in a joint statement that the extraditions were part of the “work of coordination, cooperation and bilateral reciprocity within the framework of respect for the sovereignty of both nations.”
Security Minister Omar GarcÃa Harfuch subsequently said that there was a risk that some of the 29 defendants sent to the United States could have been released from prison if they remained in Mexico.
The Mexican government hasn’t said that the 29 cartel figures were sent to the United States as part of its efforts to reach a deal to ward off tariffs.
“I renamed the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America.”
Trump did indeed rename the Gulf of Mexico, but the name change is only applicable in the United States.
President Sheinbaum proposed calling the United States — or at least the country’s southwest — “Mexican America” after Trump first announced his intention to rename the Gulf of Mexico.
Sheinbaum said last month that her government could file a civil lawsuit against Google over the tech company’s decision to change the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America for United States users of its maps website and app.
By Mexico News Daily chief staff writer Peter Davies ([email protected])
