Published September 9, 2026 at 10:43 AM CDT

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Editor's note: This story has been updated.

President Donald Trump is again questioning the value of the U.S. economic relationship with Mexico, while escalating rhetoric about the country through a series of provocative social media posts.

Speaking at the White House Friday, Trump suggested the United States could stop trading with countries where it runs a deficit. He singled out Mexico.

"If I don't trade with Mexico, they have nothing that we have to have," Trump said. "I mean, hot tamales, tomatoes, a couple of things."

But U.S. government data shows a different scene.

The U.S. imported more than $534 billion in goods from Mexico last year, according to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, making Mexico the country's largest source of imported goods.

Its leading exports to the U.S. include vehicles, machinery, electrical equipment and medical devices, along with more than $48 billion in agricultural products.

Trump's own administration describes the two economies as having a long history of integrated supply chains, particularly in autos, electronics and medical devices.

The trade friction is unfolding alongside broader, unresolved tension between the two governments. A mandatory review of the USMCA concluded July 1 without a renewal agreement; talks have since continued bilaterally, with a fourth round expected this month in Washington after Mexico and the U.S. failed to resolve disputes over automotive content rules and steel and aluminum tariffs. Security cooperation has grown strained as well.

Armando Vargas, security program coordinator at México Evalúa, says that kind of open disagreement is ultimately unsustainable for both governments. "That agreement may be unfavorable to Mexico, and even asymmetric — as economists would say, it might be a bad equilibrium," Vargas said. "But it's still an equilibrium at the end of the day." He points to the two countries' shared 3,000-kilometer border, deeply interconnected economies and a security relationship dating to 1821 as forces that push both sides back toward cooperation, whatever the current friction.

DEA Administrator Terrance Cole said last month that high-level Mexican officials work directly with drug cartels, and U.S. officials have pushed for the extradition of Sinaloa Governor Rubén Rocha Moya, who faces a U.S. drug-trafficking indictment. President Claudia Sheinbaum has denied that any formal DEA-Mexico security agreement exists.

Trump nevertheless said Friday he does not want to end trade with Mexico, adding that he likes and respects President Sheinbaum.

Speaking in Monterrey two days later, Sheinbaum said Mexico wants a good relationship with the United States and added that during Trump’s first administration, his relationship with ex-president Lopez Obrador was very good. "That is what we aspire to, a good relationship with our northern neighbor," Sheinbaum said. "That said, cooperation always, subordination never."

The rhetoric escalated over the Labor Day weekend. The White House released an AI-generated video depicting Trump as the comic-book superhero Green Lantern, using his powers to build a wall blocking migrants at the border and to create an American manufacturing complex. Then Monday, Trump posted an AI-generated map showing the American flag covering Mexico, Canada, Greenland, parts of Central America and the Caribbean, under the label "United States of America."

Sheinbaum responded within hours, without naming Trump directly. "In the month of our homeland, we reaffirm that Mexico is not and will not be a colony or protectorate of any foreign country," she wrote on social media, calling Mexico a free, independent and sovereign nation.

On Tuesday, Sheinbaum went further, telling reporters that Mexico would defend its sovereignty against any foreign power seeking to interfere in the country, and reiterated that her government would not accept foreign interference of any kind.

But that posture may not fully reflect the pressure Mexico is actually under, according to Vargas. "Mexico is under more pressure than is acknowledged in political discourse," he said. "The lack of economic growth is one of those pressures. The second is that it would be disastrous if U.S. authorities made public the evidence they possess."