Mexican President López Obrador was at the San Francisco summit where he met both Biden and Xi. Mexico is setting itself up to enhance its local power status.
With Biden, Mexico praised his lack of building border security. This in turn is what makes Biden so unpopular with large sections of the American Public. Mexico is home to the largest American community in the world outside of the United States. It included Americans of Mexican ancestry, but also many others. Fox News reports:
Biden said while sitting next to Mexico’s president, “We’re working side by side to combat arms trafficking, to tackle organized crime and to address the opioid epidemic, including fentanyl.”
The meeting comes two weeks after Fox News Digital reported that the Biden administration approved $950 million in contracts to repair and upgrade part of existing border wall construction in Arizona, California and Texas, using money from Trump-era congressional appropriations.
Mexico’s meeting with Xi was focused on economic relations. Mexico’s economy is simultaneously becoming more sophisticated while birth rates are dropping and standards of living are rising. The Hill has more:
López Obrador’s visit with Xi went beyond investment and trade talks — it signaled Mexican openness to forming strategic partnerships with China, formerly seen as a commercial rival regarding access to the U.S. market.
López Obrador’s son, seen as a close ally of Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo — the president’s chosen successor who, in September, won her party’s nomination for 2024 — turned to X to praise the Xi-López Obrador meeting.
America will need to manage its illegal migration flow while at the same time keeping strong relations with Mexico through immigration policies. President Trump’s “Remain in Mexico” was a rather balanced policy that could help resolve this issue.
READ NEXT: China and Japan Look To Move Closer
