Trump Talk of Revoking Treaties Could Backfire

While he irresponsibly runs his mouth and frightens American allies, one thing that Donald Trump has talked about is unilaterally ignoring and/or revoking foreign treaties, including treaties with NATO allies and American trading partners.  Now, a likely proposal in Mexico's legislature suggests that Trump's bloviating could come back to bite America in the ass big time.  If enacted and then acted upon by Mexico, the proposal would revoke the The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo which ceded California and a large area comprising roughly half of New Mexico, most of Arizona, Nevada, Utah, and parts of Wyoming and Colorado and gave Mexicans in those annexed areas had the choice of relocating to within Mexico's new boundaries or receiving American citizenship with full civil rights. While Mexico lacks the military power to enforce such a revocation, it might force Americans who are utterly ignorant of history (including Trump) to grasp that Hispanics lived in and controlled a huge swath of America before the United States arrived on the scene.  Here are highlights from The Independent:

You could call it tit-for-tat with a dash of Mexican drama.  Mexico is to consider a proposal to revoke its treaties with the US, including the 1848 agreement that transferred half its territory to Washington if Donald Trump is elected and tries to make the US’s southern neighbour pay for a border wall.

A Mexican senator is due on Tuesday to propose legislation that would empower the government to retaliate of Mr Trump inflicts expropriations or economic losses on his country to make it pay for a wall along the 2,000 mile border.

Armando Rios Piter, an opposition senator for the centre-left Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), hoped his initiative would protect Mexicans, and highlight the risks of targeting them economically.

“In cases where the property/assets of (our) fellow citizens or companies are affected by a foreign government, as Donald Trump has threatened, the Mexican government should proportionally expropriate assets and properties of foreigners from that country on our our territory.

Mr Rios Piter said his aim was to counter threats by Mr Trump to target Mexicans in the US and to stress that the economic welfare of both nations is at stake. His initiative also seeks to protect Mexico against unilateral changes to the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which Mr Trump has threatened to ditch.

The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was signed by the US and Mexico in 1848 to end a two-year war between the two countries, a conflict that Mexico lost. As part of the deal, Mexico handed to the US, what is now New Mexico, California, Arizona, Utah, Nevada and parts of Wyoming and Colorado. Mr Rios Piter has suggested the treaty could be scrapped if Mr Trump makes it to the White House. 

“At a time like this, it’s vital for us to understand why this relationship benefits both. We’re neighbours, we’re friends, we’re partners,” he said. “He’s [Trump's] putting that at risk.