Mexico’s richest man Carlos Slim on Monday called US President Donald Trump‘s ongoing tariff war with Mexico and claimed that this will only increase inflation in his country.
During a press conference, Slim said that Trump faces a complicated situation as US has to regain global leadership.
“What the US has to do is regain global leadership. It would be interesting if he did a sort of double play, let’s say on one side reduce the costs of certain things and on the other channel it toward investment,” Slim said.
Slim added that Trump’s tariff threats are simply a negotiating tool and said, “We already saw that the tariffs are a negotiation. They increase inflation … the interest rate doesn’t go down … tariffs don’t solve problems.”
The Mexican industrialist said that the 25% tariffs announced Monday by Trump on all steel and aluminum products wouldn’t have much impact on Mexico, because some Mexican steel producers also have US operations.
He further claimed that a general tariff on Mexican imports is unlikely, because Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum and Trump are following through on an agreement that would pause tariffs in exchange for bolstering border security.
Trump also paused tariffs on Canada, but went ahead with others on China, where products entering the United States now face an additional 10 percent levy.
Slim met Trump during his first term while negotiating the free trade agreement, describing him then as a “negotiator, not a terminator.”
