Tariffs are the New War on Drugs: Is a Punitive Tariff Policy More Effective to Combat Mexican Cartels?
Early into his second term, President Donald J. Trump declared a state of absolute national emergency over the current condition of foreign trade and economic practices. Under such circumstances and backed by the Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977 (IEEPA), the current administration acquired the ability to economically sanction countries that exhibited harmful policies against the United States’ economy or its security. These sanctions initially took the form of a 10% baseline tariff imposition for all other countries. However, the penalty imposed on Mexico differed greatly on the grounds that this country represented a greater type of crisis: drug trafficking operations.
In an attempt to fight cartels and their fentanyl drug trade, the administration sought to impose harsher tariffs on the Mexican government. An initial threat to impose a 25% tariff on imports was only the first measure. Subsequent interactions between both governments, recorded in this administration’s public fact sheets, reveal that tariffs were used as a negotiation chip to coerce the Mexican government to adopt anti-cartel security measures. Although this strategy had already been used during Trump’s first term as a trade policy, its employment towards curbing the drug trade is fairly new in its sharp contrasts with the previous approach centered around monetary aid. While the punitiveness of tariff war directly aims to target the drug trade, the measure has not allowed for the development of more effective anti-cartel mechanisms than those seen under earlier cooperation agreements
Tariff Overview: Mexico’s Actions in Response to Tariff Imposition
President Trump’s current approach has a clear-set precedent in his first presidential term. In 2019, his threats to impose tariffs on the Mexican government seemed to be more of a negotiation piece rather than a punitive measure in itself. The administration would impose a baseline 5% tariff on all imports and would increase it by 5% every month until all their demands were met. The main demand was for the flow of illegal immigrants to stop, and Trump later claimed to have negotiated the deployment of 28,000 troops across the Mexican borders to aid this purpose.
The first tariff announcements were made in February 2025, with an intention to set 25% tariffs on all imports from Mexico. The statement was then justified by a declaration of cartels colluding with the Mexican government and fentanyl posing a massive health crisis for the U.S. Thus, once again it became clear that tariffs had the purpose of targeting the drug trade. As expected, as soon as the Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum agreed to install 10,000 National Guard soldiers across the Mexican-American border, all motions of punishment were stopped. Tariff impositions were then postponed until March with the opportunity to renegotiate. By this point, the Mexican militarization of the border as a means to protect the United States was complying with most of the American administration’s demands.
However, the U.S. government is yet to transform the agreement to implement security measures by Mexico into proper strategies to fight off cartels. According to the White House, their actions follow a commitment to leverage the United States’ privileged economic position as a tool to eradicate the influence of cartels. At this moment, the increase of military presence does not dismantle these organizations, showing that the administration has been unsuccessful in fulfilling their goal. Final tariffs were renegotiated and imposed in March at a 25% rate on all goods that are not part of the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA). With these in place, President Trump confirmed that he had intentions to lead joint Mexican-American military operations to wage a war against cartels in Mexican territory. However, he later claimed that he was unable to further his plan because the Mexican government refused the idea. This result illuminates how joint military interventions to fight drug distribution networks, namely fentanyl, were the final stage of the tariff war. Nevertheless, punitive negotiations have not been able to secure anything further than extra protection to the border.
Monetary Aid as a Forgone Incentive Policy Against Cartels
Prior to tariffs pressuring the Mexican government into compliance, the United States’ policy was to provide monetary aid and military resources as an incentive to adopt anti-cartel measures. The U.S. government opted for a military interventionist approach—accompanied by providing all provisions—that had been kept up since the 2006 War on Drugs. The 2007 Merida Initiative consolidated a series of pacts between the Mexican and American governments, in which Mexico agreed to tackle corruption and the U.S. to diminish their demand for drugs. As such, security cooperation attempts between both nations initially consisted of strengthening the Mexican military via financial or other military resources. By the time these pacts ended in 2023, the American government had awarded more than $3.6 billion to fund the War on Drugs with the expectation of Mexico reciprocating by eradicating drug trafficking operations (DTOs).
Receiving constant financial awards proved both an incentive and a tool for the Mexican government to adopt new measures for combating organized crime, particularly at the height of the so-called War on Drugs, between 2007 and 2012. For starters, there was a significant increase of national military operatives and a betterment of their equipment in response to funds provided by the American Foreign Military Financing (FMF). This was followed by an agreement to allow American military institutions within Mexican territory for operations targeting high-profile operations. The newly specialized joint military forces ceased to prioritize the mere protection of the border and instead focused on targeting other areas with a high drug trafficking presence. As better-equipped forces spread out across the country, it allowed for them to deploy coordinated military action in an attempt to debilitate cartels.
The agreements reached through monetary aid during the War on Drugs echo President Trump's demands through tariffs: militarization as a means to combat drug trafficking operations. While it is true that, in recent months, an agreement to increase the National Guard presence across the border was reached, it works only as a security measure rather than a way of addressing the root problem. This time, despite Trump’s efforts to do so once again, the Mexican government didn’t allow for American forces to partake in the military operations against DTOs. On the contrary, recent tariff negotiations did not manage to secure any deal that posed a solution to the production or distribution of fentanyl and other drugs. It thus becomes clear that imposing punitive tariffs had a shorter scope of impact on government action than awarding financial resources initially did. Granting monetary resources undoubtedly facilitated larger-scale counter-cartel programs and operational involvement by covering costs that the Mexican government, by itself, was not willing to cover. Tariffs exert pressure but cannot provide sufficient support for Mexico to adopt more strategically effective measures to fight organized crime or entirely comply with American demands.
Militarization: The Same Short-Sighted Approach of Tariffs and Monetary Aid
The country’s history, however, might be another reason as to why the Mexican government refused American involvement and all other military operations this time around. Mexico has experienced the detrimental effects that militarizing a country to fight cartels has on the spread of violence and drug trafficking. After all, as the current American administration pursues to adopt similar measures to those during the War on Drugs, there is reason to be wary of eliciting the same results. Evaluating the effects that militarization had on cartel presence and lethal violence in previous decades could be used to validate the decision of avoiding it.
Joint military operations during the War on Drugs acted in accordance with their kingpin strategy, meaning that they went after the leaders of cartels with the intention of dismantling them. However, such actions were counterproductive; as leaders were seized or eliminated, it created a power vacuum that led to fights within and between cartels for control over the territory. As a direct result, there was a fragmentation of cartels into smaller, highly undetectable ones that spread across the whole country. The drug supply increased as it became more difficult to locate its source, and lethal violence rose to never-seen levels due to the spread and skirmishes of newer cartels. These effects did not limit themselves to Mexican territory. Instead, they were initially felt through the heightened cartel activity across the Mexican-American border. Ultimately, militarization neither decreased the supply of drugs that entered the United States nor did it curb the lethal violence rates associated with its trafficking.
President Trump’s administration justified its state of national emergency by citing the crisis posed by the Mexican drug influx and its associated cartel violence. Tariffs were intended as a means to fight them with the ultimate goal of direct military action. Regardless of the negotiation process, the evidence seems to suggest that militarization is more likely to exacerbate the problem. Cartels may, once again, fragment in response to attacks. After all, they already possess the knowledge of how ultimately successful it was for the drug business. The drug supply and lethal violence observed may equally rise in response. So long as imposing tariffs aims to force Mexico into militarization, it will have the same disastrous results that it has historically had, prompted by the spread of DTOs.
Conclusion
If anything can be learned from the American tariffs’ recent punitive approach, it’s that they have neither shown to dismantle the influence of drug cartels, nor have they set any precedent for adopting a more effective strategy to combat them. Thus, tariffs have failed their initial purpose. Part of the reason is because of their shorter reach when it comes to prompting the Mexican government into systematic action. Without providing appropriate resources, Mexico might not be willing or able to cover costs associated with updating or remaking national anti-cartel protocols. There is a limit to the operational involvement that pressure exerted by foreign tariff policy can elicit.
However, the effectiveness of a punitive tariff policy in regard to incentivizing monetary aid will achieve the same outcome as long as the strategy they seek is militarization. Paradoxically, it will not even achieve any anti-cartel set goals but instead further the violent reach that the drug trade already has over both countries. After so many failed attempts to eliminate or even diminish the influence of the drug trade, it becomes clear that a complete restructuring of security institutions and response protocols is only the first step. International intelligence cooperation and economic development are factors that can strengthen Mexico’s government to take a better-researched and coordinated stance against cartel overreach.
Even while leaving monetary aid to the side, these conditions can only be achieved through a bilaterally healthy relationship that allows for the direct and immediate flow of insight and support between the United States and Mexico. By contrast, current punitive tariff policies neither aid Mexico in its fight against cartels nor do they improve existing drug conditions in the United States. Despite the initial intent of tariffs, they now function as an added barrier toward eradicating the crisis caused by cartels and drug trafficking.