Mexico’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs will operate in 2025 with 700 million fewer pesos (about $33.8 million) than in 2024, a budget cut that will affect consular services for millions of Mexicans in the United States when they will need them most.
Ever since President-elect Donald Trump won a second term in the White House, Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum has reiterated there is “a plan” to face the challenge of the massive deportations he promised during his 2024 campaign. Talk of this plan from Sheinbaum has been accompanied by reassurances that Trump’s hardline immigration agenda is not feasible because migrants are too valuable to the U.S. economy. Meanwhile, in the northern Mexico city of Monterrey, Father Luis Eduardo Zavala talks about doubling the bed capacity of the shelters at Casa Monarca, an organization that offers protection to migrants.
“We’ve been preparing for years for this context,” Zavala explains, while reviewing plans for expansion to welcome incoming deportees. The Sheinbaum government’s denialism paired with border communities’ practicality reveal the deep fault lines in how Mexico is preparing to respond to what Trump has said will be the largest deportation operation in American history.
