MEXICO CITY — Tens of thousands of Mexicans poured into the country’s most important plaza on Sunday to cheer President Claudia Sheinbaum after she succeeded in one of the most daunting challenges in global politics: negotiating with Donald Trump.
on all Mexican and Canadian products “out of respect for President Sheinbaum,” he said. It was the second time in two months that the Mexican leader won a delay of the penalties.
Supporters of Sheinbaum’s party, top business leaders and ordinary citizens packed the capital’s iconic Zócalo on Sunday, chanting, “Mexico! Mexico!” in a sign of how the nation’s first female president has unified the population. Sheinbaum’s approval rating leaped from 70 percent when she took office in October to 85 percent last month, according to a poll by the newspaper El Financiero.
, have been upended in the riptide of Trump’s wrath. Sheinbaum, in contrast, has emerged from her encounters with the U.S. president “looking even and measured,” said Carin Zissis, a fellow at the Mexico Institute of the Wilson Center in Washington. “It has given her a global presence that is distinct.”
in a massive operation involving 20 jets. But she hasn’t hesitated to challenge him, either.
“We cannot cede our sovereignty,” Sheinbaum told the massive, flag-waving crowd. “Nor can we let our people be hurt by decisions that foreign governments or powers make.”
, the founder of their leftist Morena party.
U.S. military strikes on fentanyl targets in Mexico. He could cripple Mexico’s export-reliant economy with recurrent tariff threats and pressure on auto manufacturers to relocate to the United States.
— who have built a constructive dialogue with Trump, Ventura said, adding: “It’s a win.”
Sheinbaum is no longer just López Obrador’s protégée
Sheinbaum’s diplomatic skill has surprised Mexicans who viewed her mainly as López Obrador’s handpicked successor.
by just over 30 percentage points.
But she has been criticized as a brainy technocrat who moved in lockstep with López Obrador, even imitating his country-boy drawl. The Mexican constitution prohibits presidents from seeking reelection. Nonetheless, López Obrador, known by his initials, AMLO, still wields enormous influence in the Morena party.
. The two men sit at opposite ends of the political spectrum, but they bonded as charismatic founders of antiestablishment movements.
Sheinbaum, in contrast, is a low-key scientist with a PhD in energy engineering. She can be so unemotional that her main rival in the presidential race, Xóchitl Gálvez, dubbed her the “Ice Lady.”
How has Sheinbaum succeeded with Trump?
She says she has benefited from AMLO’s warm relationship with the U.S. leader. But she has brought her own strengths to the job. She prepares rigorously for calls with Trump, aides say, consulting her cabinet ministers, business leaders and others, and studying the U.S. president’s statements. She doesn’t take umbrage at his insults, they say, and instead calmly lays out facts.
, alleging a lack of progress by Mexico and Canada on stopping cross-border fentanyl shipments, Sheinbaum sent him a graphic with data from the Department of Homeland Security. It showed U.S. seizures at the southern border plummeting since October. Less fentanyl was reaching the United States because it was being stopped in Mexico, Sheinbaum told Trump.
“He didn’t know about this graphic until we sent it to him,” she later told reporters.
In another call, Sheinbaum told Trump about the Mexican government’s publicity campaign to discourage fentanyl use. Trump was impressed. “You know, I make so many calls, and I never learn anything from anybody,” the U.S. president said last month. “And I spoke to this woman, as soon as she said it … I said, ‘Exactly, what a great idea.’” He soon announced a multimillion-dollar campaign of his own.
, a main trafficker of the opioid.
As for the ad campaign against fentanyl, it was largely designed to impress the U.S. government, said one prominent Morena official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to comment. Mexico has no fentanyl-use epidemic.
Still, Sheinbaum has also made politically risky moves to assuage Trump’s concerns, starting when he first threatened to impose tariffs in early February. She has roughly doubled military forces at the U.S. border and handed over the 29 cartel leaders in an operation that legal scholars said violated Mexican law. Mexico has taken back not just its own migrants but also people from other countries deported from the United States.
following the U.S. threats, Sheinbaum has held off each time, seeking dialogue. As U.S. stock markets plunged and retailers warned of higher prices, the pressure mounted on Trump to call off the measures.
The Mexican government “built off that pressure without having to actually put out their own measures,” said John Creamer, a former senior U.S. diplomat in Mexico. The result? The Mexicans “don’t get Trump’s ire, the way the Canadians do.”
Sheinbaum is consolidating her power
Morena holds majorities in both houses of Congress and a virtual lock on power, thanks largely to López Obrador’s popularity. Now, analysts say, Sheinbaum is coming into her own.
When asked in the February poll who exercises the most power in Mexico, 49 percent of respondents answered Sheinbaum, while only 11 percent answered López Obrador. (Roughly one-fourth of Mexicans replied “organized crime.”)
Sheinbaum’s expulsion of the 29 drug traffickers was a pivotal moment, political analyst Carlos Heredia said. “With this action, she essentially slammed her fist on the table and said, ‘I’m in command,’” he said.
that is likely to reduce the independence of Mexico’s courts, analysts say.
Sheinbaum scheduled Sunday’s rally to announce her countermeasures to Trump’s tariffs. Once they were postponed, it turned into a victory celebration.
Luis Ramirez, 74, an electrician from Michoacán state who attended, said Sheinbaum “has all of our support.” But the negotiations with Trump continue. “As our president said, we need to stay serene and patient — very patient,” he said.
