TRAVERSE CITY — Mexican Consul General Roberto Nicholas Vazquez wants the people of Michigan to know one important thing: “The Mexican people are your partners, not your enemies.”
“Trade between Mexico and Michigan was nearly $84 billion in 2024,” he said. “That’s more than the total amount of trade between the entire U.S. and Brazil last year. We have a deep and growing economic relationship that benefits both countries – and especially Michigan.”
Vazquez visited Traverse City this week to speak at the International Affairs Forum event called “North America 2.0,” which took place at Dennos Museum on the campus of Northwestern Michigan College in partnership with the Economic Club of Traverse City.
He was joined on stage by Canadian Consul General Colin Bird and moderator Major Gen. Mike Lehnert, USMC Ret., who co-chairs the IAF advisory board.
The current tariff-related tensions between the United States, Canada and Mexico are part of a larger picture that includes ongoing protests over accelerating arrests by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.
Large and sometimes violent crowds in Los Angeles, New York and elsewhere have captured worldwide attention since enforcement activities intensified.
However, Vazquez and Bird are mostly focused on trade issues rather than immigration, per se. A flurry of fast-changing tariff orders from the Trump administration is making their jobs especially challenging.
“Our relationship has its challenges, for sure,” Vazquez said before a crowd of about 150 people at the Milliken Auditorium, “but there’s still a lot we can do together and I’m hopeful we can resolve our differences.”
The economies of Mexico, Canada and the U.S. are so tightly connected by interlocking supply chains that it’s almost impossible to imagine a prosperous North America without them, he said.
“Through previous trade agreements, companies in our three nations found a way to be really efficient,” he added. “When tariffs hit, those same industries become really inefficient and we lose ground to our global competitors.”
FAR BEYOND TOURISM
While many Americans know Mexico best as a tourist destination, the nation of 130 million has also developed a diversified, fast-growing economy over the last 50 years.
According to a recent World Bank study, Mexico is now the 13th largest country in the world in terms of nominal gross domestic product and purchasing power.
Mexico’s leading exports to the United States include vehicles, auto parts, machinery and medical devices, along with more than $48 billion in agricultural products, such as fresh vegetables, beer, distilled spirits, and fresh fruit. Many of the industrial goods end up in Michigan, consulate officials said.
The outdated image of Mexico as a sleepy, somewhat impoverished country no longer reflects reality, Vazquez emphasized.
“A hundred years ago, we didn’t have a middle class in Mexico,” he said. “Now we have a large and growing middle class, along with a booming educational infrastructure.”
Today, Mexico has nearly 1,250 institutions of higher education, including public and private universities, technological institutes and other public educational centers.
On the technical front, “the labor force in Mexico is brimming with talent, especially in engineering,” according to a report from manufacturing consultant NovaLink. “Roughly 110,000 to 130,000 engineers graduate from Mexican universities every year.”
Because the North American auto industry is so integrated, about 11,000 Mexican engineers are now working in the Detroit area where Vazquez’s current office is located. Many more come to attend the state’s universities and technical training centers.
“About 47 percent of the student visas granted for Mexican students are for study in Michigan,” he said. “It’s one of the best ways to grow our connections with U.S. employers.”
Recently, some Trump officials sent a message that international students are not welcome in the United States, Vazquez noted: “I think that sends the wrong signal. Some of our Mexican students think they may have better opportunities studying in Canada.”
BATTLING DRUG CARTELS
Drug trafficking by large cartels is one of the persistent sore spots in the U.S.-Mexico relationship. Earlier this year, the Trump administration declared the major drug cartels to be “terrorist organizations.”
Vazquez said his government, under new President Claudia Sheinbaum, is working much harder to target drug cartels since she took office in October 2024.
However, Mexico calls the cartels “criminal organizations” rather than terrorists – for a reason.
“Think about it,” Vazquez told the Record-Eagle after the Thursday evening forum. “If you call them terrorists, then ‘John Doe’ in the United States who buys street drugs is financing terrorists. And the Americans who sell guns to the cartels are enabling terrorists.”
To counter the drug cartels, Mexico has spent billions of dollars to re-organize, equip and train its law enforcement and military personnel.
In 2008, the U.S. Congress approved $1.6 billion to support the so-called “Mérida Initiative” for Mexico and Central American counties. The program provided technical training and advanced technology for justice systems in those counties.
Vazquez said those anti-cartel efforts will continue. At the same time, he mentions the deep involvement of American gangs and criminal networks in drug trafficking. Violence on both sides is a serious and persistent problem.
IMMIGRATION ISSUES
Finding solutions to the current turmoil over immigration is not Vazquez’s main focus currently.
Although he is aware of that some immigrants have committed crimes in the United States, Vazquez said that, in his experience, “the vast majority of Mexican immigrants to the United States simply want to work, to build a better future for their families and their children.”
Mexicans are by far the largest group of immigrants in the Unites States today, according to the Migration Policy Institute. In 2023, about 10.9 million people living in the U.S. were born in Mexico, making up about 23 percent of all foreign-born residents.
However, the door swings both ways, Vazquez noted.
“About 2 million Americans ‘ex-pats’ now live in Mexico,” he said. “And 19 million Mexicans visit the U.S. every year, mostly on the West and East coasts. That flow of tourists is a huge opportunity for Michigan for people who want to enjoy winter sports or summer camps.”
AUDIENCE QUESTIONS
An audience member at Thursday’s forum asked the panel what they’d “most like to see” from the Trump administration, going forward.
For his part, Vazquez said his government would most like to see “a clear set of objectives” that further the goals of the 2020 USMCA trade agreement.
“Let’s move forward on that very successful foundation,” he added. “Business leaders need that type of stability for planning and investment purposes. Our supply chains are so intertwined now that we really need it.”
Another audience member asked both Vazquez and Canadian Consul General Bird what issues need more attention in the years to come.
Together, they mentioned the growing role of artificial intelligence, the dawn of quantum computing, immigration policy and national security.
“Let’s turn the page on our differences and realize that we are natural partners,” Vazquez said in closing. “We know we are bound to work together.”