Trump Suddenly Reverses Some Mexico Tariffs After Massive Backlash

Just two days after he started a global trade war, Donald Trump is already walking back some of the tariffs he implemented—again.

In a Truth Social post Thursday, the president announced Mexico will not pay tariffs on any products that comply with the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, or USMCA, until April 2.

On Tuesday, Trump implemented 25 percent tariffs on Mexico and Canada, a disastrous move that plummeted financial markets and prompted retaliatory actions from both American trading partners.

Following the news, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum took a measured approach to dealing with the reactionary American leader. She promised to safeguard Mexico’s interests and announced she would implement tariffs of U.S. goods, but not until Sunday, giving her and Trump enough time to negotiate a deal. It worked.

“After speaking with President Claudia Sheinbaum of Mexico, I have agreed that Mexico will not be required to pay Tariffs on anything that falls under the USMCA Agreement.” Trump wrote on Truth Social Thursday. “I did this as an accommodation, and out of respect for, President Sheinbaum.”

It’s just the latest walkback from Trump, who is endlessly flip-flopping on a decision that would spur economic catastrophe across the U.S. and abroad.

He first threatened to impose tariffs on February 1, but later agreed to a 30-day pause after widespread backlash. After finally beginning the tariffs on Tuesday, he’s already granted a one-month exemption to U.S. automobile companies, and now to USMCA products.

Who knows what the next move will be in Trump’s relentless pursuit to implement tariffs, and rid the U.S. of its allies while he’s at it.

Donald Trump may introduce a new travel ban similar to the “Muslim ban” from his first term, possibly as soon as next week.

Reuters reports that the order would bar people from Afghanistan and Pakistan from entering the United States, based on a government review of security and vetting risks, citing three anonymous sources, who also said that other countries could be included.

In his first term, Trump used a series of executive orders that infamously banned visitors from the Muslim-majority countries of Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen. Iraq was initially included, but later dropped after the country promised to improve vetting for its own citizens. Despite several legal challenges, the Supreme Court ultimately approved the ban in 2018, and Trump later added six more countries with large Muslim populations to the list.

If Trump’s new ban becomes a reality, it will complicate efforts to resettle tens of thousands of Afghans cleared to come to the U.S. as refugees or on “special immigrant visas” because they worked for the U.S. and fear retribution after the Taliban took control of Afghanistan.

According to one of the sources, the State Department Coordinator for Afghan Relocation Efforts is trying to get an exemption for special immigrant visa holders, “but it’s not assumed likely to be granted,” especially since that office was told to plan for its closure by April.

While campaigning for president in 2023, Trump floated the idea of reinstating and expanding the “Muslim ban,” calling for a “strong ideological screening of all immigrants to the United States” and saying he would ban immigrants from Libya, Somalia, Syria, and Yemen, “or anywhere else that threatens our security.”

In Trump’s first term, the travel ban caused a lot of confusion and chaos, with thousands of people, including immigration lawyers, gathering at airports to protest the move. If the ban comes back, Trump will have a more compliant judiciary. The question is whether protesters will show up in the same numbers with support from Democratic politicians.

Democrats’ so-called resistance to Donald Trump is getting bad reviews among voters.

A new survey from Blueprint, a liberal research firm, found that registered voters have lost the plot on what—if anything—Democratic lawmakers are doing to oppose Trump’s sweeping agenda to shrink the federal workforce, slash essential government programs, and roll back regulations and rights.

A whopping 40 percent of respondents said that the Democratic Party doesn’t have any strategy at all for responding to Trump. Meanwhile, 24 percent of respondents said that the party did have a strategy but that it wasn’t working, and only 10 percent of respondents said that it had a good strategy.

The poll of 1,383 registered voters was conducted between February 16 and 17. Since then, the Democrats’ means of resistance have only gotten more confused.

Ahead of Trump’s address to Congress Tuesday, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries urged his party to take a measured approach and have a “strong” and “dignified” presence at the president’s Capitol appearance. Still, Democratic lawmakers protested in several increasingly small ways. Some lawmakers, such as Florida Representative Maxwell Frost and Texas Representative Jasmine Crockett, walked out of Trump’s address. Others held up small signs with slogans such as, “Musk Steals,” “False,” and “Save Medicaid.” A small contingent wore pink, a failed signal of unity and a devastating blow to absolutely no one.

Only Texas Representative Al Green managed to do any actual protesting, waving his cane and crying out that Trump had “no mandate” to cut Medicaid. Green was escorted out of the chamber, and on Thursday, he was formally censured by his colleagues—including 10 Democrats.

Evan Roth Smith, Blueprint’s top pollster, told Politico that voters had “correctly identified that the Democratic Party has lost its way.”

“The Democratic response [Tuesday] night was more or less a continuation of what we’ve seen from Democrats so far,” Smith explained. “Which is, there was nothing overtly wrong about it, but it didn’t actually do anything to ameliorate this core issue Democrats face, which is voters aren’t quite sure what we stand for and would like us to get back to the basic principles of the party.”

Sixty-five percent of respondents agreed with the statement that the Democratic Party “needs to get back to basics” of protecting Social Security and Medicare, reproductive freedom, and workers’ rights. Sixty-five percent of respondents also agreed with the statement that “no one has any idea what the Democratic Party stands for anymore, other than opposing Donald Trump. Democrats have no message, no plan of their own, and no one knows what they would do if they got back into power.”

Ten Democrats joined the Republican-led House in censuring Representative Al Green for disrupting Donald Trump’s speech to Congress on Tuesday and protesting the president’s aggressive cuts to Medicaid.

“You have no mandate to cut Medicaid!” the Texas Democrat yelled while waving his cane. Green was later removed from the chamber, becoming the first member of Congress to be removed during a presidential address.

“I did it from my heart and I will suffer whatever the consequences are,” he told reporters the next day. “But truthfully, I would do it again.”

Republican Representative Dan Newhouse quickly introduced a censure against Green, which Democrats failed to block Wednesday.

On Thursday, the House voted 224 to 198, with 10 Democrats joining the GOP in punishing one of their own. Green and Democratic Representative Shomari Figures voted present.

The following Democrats voted to censure Green:

1. Ami Bera—California
2. Ed Case—Hawaii
   
3. Jim Costa—California
4. Laura Gillen—New York
5. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez—Washington
   
6. Jim Himes—Connecticut
7. Chrissy Houlahan—Pennsylvania
   
8. Marcy Kaptur—Ohio
   
9. Jared Moskowitz—Florida
10. Tom Suozzi—New York

Donald Trump is planning to give Israel everything it needs in order to “finish” Gaza.

In a harrowing post to Truth Social Wednesday, the president threatened Hamas, as well as the Palestinian public, to release the hostages—or be “dead.”

“‘Shalom Hamas’ means Hello and Goodbye—You can choose,” Trump wrote. “Release all of the Hostages now, not later, and immediately return all of the dead bodies of the people you murdered, or it is OVER for you. Only sick and twisted people keep bodies, and you are sick and twisted!

“I am sending Israel everything it needs to finish the job, not a single Hamas member will be safe if you don’t do as I say. I have just met with your former Hostages whose lives you have destroyed,” Trump continued. “This is your last warning! For the leadership, now is the time to leave Gaza, while you still have a chance. Also, to the People of Gaza: A beautiful Future awaits, but not if you hold Hostages. If you do, you are DEAD! Make a SMART decision. RELEASE THE HOSTAGES NOW, OR THERE WILL BE HELL TO PAY LATER!”

Trump then signed the message: “DONALD J. TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.”

Hamas has been in direct talks with U.S. presidential envoy for hostage affairs Adam Boehler to release several American-Israeli dual citizens who were taken hostage during the October 7 attack, Axios reported Wednesday. It’s the first time the U.S. has backtracked on its unofficial mantra of not dealing with terrorists. The U.S. designated Hamas as a terrorist organization in 1997.

“This saves time and effort and minimizes obstacles. Talks are not going very easily, but this is positive,” a Hamas official told NPR, adding that the U.S. had asked the militant group to remain quiet about the deal.

There are currently 59 hostages remaining in Gaza. Fifty-eight of them were abducted during the October 7 attack, while one more was captured before that.

But Trump’s interest in pushing Gazans out of their homeland isn’t so altruistic. Last month, the president said he was “committed to buying and owning Gaza.”

“We’re committed to owning it, taking it, and making sure that Hamas doesn’t move back,” Trump said at the time. “There’s nothing to move back into—the place is a demolition site. The remainder will be demolished. Everything’s demolished.”

The real estate mogul then added that he intended to make it a “very good site for future development.”

That somebody could be Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, who has been eyeing the region for potential real estate projects since at least the beginning of last year. In March 2024, Kushner praised Gaza’s waterfront beachfront property as “very valuable,” advocating at the time for the same plan that Trump touted last week: ethnic cleansing.

Meanwhile, American culture seems misaligned with the new mission. On Sunday, No Other Land—a film about an Israeli and a Palestinian who work in tandem to rebuild homes and communities in the West Bank’s Masafer Yatta after they are systemically claimed and destroyed by Israeli soldiers and settlers—won best documentary feature film at the Oscars.