Trump Backs Off Threat To Close Border, Gives Mexico One Year “Warning”

OTAY MESA, CALIFORNIA - APRIL 03: Construction continues on a secondary border barrier on the U.S. side of the U.S.-Mexico border, as trucks are lined up on the Mexican side to enter the U.S. (L), on April 3, 2019 in Otay Mesa, California. The Department of Homeland Security is building 12.5 miles of secondary border barrier in San Diego county as part of U.S. President Donald Trump's Border Security and Immigration Enforcement Improvements executive order. Trump told reporters last week “there's a very good likelihood” that he will close the U.S. Southern border this week. (Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)

On Thursday, it appeared he might have been doing just that, as he backed away from the immediate threat and said he’s giving Mexico a “one-year warning” about migrants and drugs. He also came up with a new threat: taxing automobiles built south of the border.

“If the drugs don’t stop or largely stop, we’re gonna put tariffs on Mexico and products, in particular cars,” Trump said. “The whole ballgame is cars. If they don’t do it, we’re gonna tax the cars. And if that doesn’t work, we’re gonna close the borders.”

Trump told reporters that he is giving Mexico a "one-year warning" before taking action.

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“The apparent turnaround comes amid mounting warnings from advisers and business leaders that closing the 2,000-mile border with Mexico, the United States’s third-largest trading partner, could be economically devastating to both countries,” reports the Washington Post.

The economic concerns prompted some top Republicans to caution Trump against carrying out his shutdown plan.

Axios quotes “a source who has been talking to Trump about the border situation” as saying the president is “very well aware that there’s a commercial trucking component that would be devastating on Mexico and would be hurtful to the United States.”

“Closing down the border would have potentially catastrophic economic impact on our country, and I would hope we would not be doing that,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) said on Tuesday.

Trump will visit the border on Friday.

“In an interview on ‘Fox & Friends’ Thursday morning, White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said Trump was making the trip so that Americans will ‘get a chance to see some of the things that are going on, on the ground, and hear from the people dealing with this crisis day in and day out,’” the Post says.

Meanwhile, Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced the House will take the unusual step of filing suit against Donald Trump’s emergency declaration on the southern border. “The President’s action clearly violates the Appropriations Clause by stealing from appropriated funds, an action that was not authorized by constitutional or statutory authority,” according to Pelosi.