The United States is gearing up for something reckless: a war on Mexico, packaged by Trump and MAGA as a crusade against fentanyl and the so-called “terrorist” cartels.
No one here is defending drug trafficking or organized crime—but that’s not what this is really about.
So why is the United States really preparing to attack Mexico and stop any reforms? Two words: power and labor.
Washington is feeling its global influence slipping—its “soft power” questioned abroad, its military power stretched thin. Mexico, meanwhile, is not sending migrants north in the same numbers it once did. Enforcement plays a role, sure, but the deeper truth is that Mexico is finally beginning to emerge from its historical malaise. Mexico has moved toward a new and different path, but the U.S. does not want the abusive historical cyclical relationship to end.
Mexico today is not as beholden to U.S. economic power as it once was. In fact, it could be argued that it is the United States that depends far more on Mexico than it admits.
Mexican labor has been vital to many economic sectors that would otherwise struggle to survive without it—agriculture, hospitality, manufacturing, food processing, construction, kitchens, and nurseries, to name a few. Without this low wage Mexican labor subsidy, the broader U.S. economy would be challenged.