Mexico City, Mexico – Mexico began mobilizing National Guard troops to the U.S. border on Tuesday, following a brief standoff between President Claudia Sheinbaum and U.S. President Donald Trump in which the latter threatened tariffs if Mexico didn’t commit to stemming the flow of migrants and drugs into the U.S.
The “northern border operation” is part of an agreement reached between the two leaders on Monday which would put a temporary halt on tariffs in exchange for Mexico sending 10,000 National Guard troops to the border to combat irregular migration and drug smuggling – particularly fentanyl.
On Tuesday, President Sheinbaum said the troop movements were a strategic “reorientation of the forces” to border states in northern Mexico, and wouldn’t impede security in other parts of Mexico.
She claimed that some of the troops redirected to the northern border would come from areas of the country facing lower security threats. “In other words, she said at her morning briefing, “it is a deployment that does not leave the rest of the country without security.”
The largest deployment of troops was reportedly to Baja California on Mexico’s northwest border with California where 3,010 troops were redirected. Chihuahua, on the border with Texas and New Mexico, reportedly received 2,620 guardsmen, and Sonora, which mostly borders Arizona, received 1,987.
According to the U.S. Border and Customs Protection, most undocumented immigrants enter through the U.S.’s southwestern border, with 2,135,005 encounters with asylum seekers reported in 2024. The cities of San Diego, Tucson, and El Paso led in the number of irregular crossings by asylum seekers.
With the military reinforcement of the border, Sheinbaum continues to uphold her predecessor’s approach to appease Mexico’s largest trading partner, the use of armed forces to deter migratory flows headed north.
During the administration of former President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, the Mexican government used its military to contain immigration under the direct instruction of Trump during his first term.
López Obrador used more troops to detain immigrants than to tackle national security concerns such as fuel smuggling, also known as “huachicoleo” in Mexico.
The resulting violence and human rights violations from this practice carry on under Sheinbaum as 10 migrants have been murdered by her soldiers in the first month of her administration.
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