Mexico has avoided the implementation of a 30% tariff on its exports to the United States that was scheduled to take effect this Friday Aug. 1
President Claudia Sheinbaum and United States President Donald Trump announced that the proposed duty wouldn’t take effect on Friday after they spoke by telephone on Thursday morning.
“We had a very good call with the president of the United States, Donald Trump. We avoided the tariff increase announced for tomorrow and secured 90 days to build a long-term agreement through dialogue,” Sheinbaum wrote on social media.
On his social media site, Truth Social, Trump said that his call with Sheinbaum was “very successful in that, more and more, we are getting to know and understand each other.”
“The complexities of a Deal with Mexico are somewhat different than other Nations because of both the problems, and assets, of the Border. We have agreed to extend, for a 90 Day period, the exact same Deal as we had for the last short period of time, namely, that Mexico will continue to pay a 25% Fentanyl Tariff, 25% Tariff on Cars, and 50% Tariff on Steel, Aluminum, and Copper,” he wrote.
“Additionally, Mexico has agreed to immediately terminate its Non Tariff Trade Barriers, of which there were many. We will be talking to Mexico over the next 90 Days with the goal of signing a Trade Deal somewhere within the 90 Day period of time, or longer,” Trump said.
Tuvimos una muy buena llamada con el presidente de Estados Unidos, Donald Trump. Evitamos el aumento de aranceles anunciado para mañana y logramos 90 días para construir un acuerdo de largo plazo a partir del diálogo.
Me acompañaron Juan Ramón de la Fuente, secretario de… pic.twitter.com/in3W4eAICN
— Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo (@Claudiashein) July 31, 2025
He also said that “there will be continued cooperation on the Border as it relates to all aspects of Security, including Drugs, Drug Distribution, and Illegal Immigration into the United States.”
Status quo maintained; most trade with US is tariff-free
The “25% fentanyl tariff” Trump referred to is a duty on non-USMCA compliant goods that took effect in March.
Economy Minister Marcelo Ebrard said this week that 84% of Mexico’s trade with its northern neighbor complies with the USMCA and is therefore tariff-free.
U.S. content in vehicles made in Mexico is exempt from the United States’ 25% auto tariff, lowering the effective duty on Mexican cars to 15% on average, according to Ebrard.
It was uncertain whether the 30% duty proposed by Trump would have applied to all imports from Mexico, or just those that don’t comply with the rules of the USMCA, the three-way free trade pact that includes the United States, Mexico and Canada.
The U.S. president didn’t provide any clarity on the issue in his Truth Social post on Thursday morning.
Trump informed Sheinbaum of his plan to impose a 30% tariff on imports from Mexico in a July 11 letter. A common interpretation of his remarks in that letter was that the proposed duty would only apply to non-USMCA compliant products, and would have thus increased the current rate by five percentage points.
In recent days, Sheinbaum expressed confidence that her government would reach an agreement with the Trump administration to stave off the 30% tariff.
Last month, she proposed a “general” or “global” agreement between Mexico and the United States covering trade, security and migration.
It appears that such an agreement is likely to be reached sometime in the next 90 days.
‘We achieved a good agreement’
“We achieved a good agreement,” Sheinbaum said at the start of her Thursday morning press conference, held at the later time of 10 a.m. due to her call with Trump.
She said that she spoke to her U.S. counterpart for around 40 minutes, and was accompanied by Ebrard, Foreign Affairs Minister Juan Ramón de la Fuente and Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister for North America Roberto Velasco.
Sheinbaum highlighted that the United States existing tariffs would remain in place and noted that there is a period of 90 days to continue engaging with the U.S. government in order to a establish a “longer-term agreement.”
She said that the deal struck with Trump on Thursday morning is “important” because existing tariffs won’t rise, at least in the short term.
Sheinbaum also said the deal “protects the USMCA” as the majority of Mexico’s trade with the United States will remain tariff-free.
“That is very important,” she said, highlighting that the current 25% tariff — the so-called “fentanyl tariff” — only applies to products made in Mexico that don’t comply with the USMCA.
Sheinbaum said that “within the new trade world order” established by Trump’s protectionist agenda, Mexico has “the best agreement possible.”
“… Investing in Mexico continues to be the best option. We have a very good situation in the face of this new international order,” she said.
” …Our strategy worked,” Sheinbaum said, referring to her government’s trade negotiation strategy, which included a commitment to work to reduce Mexico’s large trade surplus with the United States while cracking down on the production of fentanyl in Mexico and ramping up efforts to stop the drug reaching the U.S.
She said that her government maintained a “cool head” in those negotiations, which were led by Ebrard, who has made frequent trips to Washington since Trump’s second term as president began on Jan. 20.
Mexico News Daily
