Mexican president says she did not discuss tariffs nor agree to close border in call with Trump

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said Thursday that she did not address President-elect Donald Trump’s plan to impose a 25% tariff over immigration concerns and did not agree to shut down the border, as Trump claimed. 

At a press conference, Sheinbaum said the pair discussed illegal immigration and drug trafficking, over which Trump had threatened to impose tariffs, but did not come to any agreement to close the border or stop illegal migration, per Reuters. 

"It was a good conversation and we are going to keep having conversations,” Sheinbaum said. 

On Wednesday, Trump claimed in a post to Truth Social that the Mexican president had agreed to “stop migration through Mexico, and into the United States, effectively closing our southern Border.” 

However, Sheinbaum says she presented a strategy that "attended to” migrants before they arrived at the border. 

"Mexico's stance is not to close borders, but to build bridges between governments and their peoples,” she said in a post to X.