President-elect Donald Trump introduced plans to rename the Gulf of Mexico to “the Gulf of America” as a part of his freewheeling, typically wild speech at Mar-a-Lago on Tuesday.
“We’re going to be changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America,” Trump mentioned. “What a beautiful name. And it’s appropriate. It’s appropriate. And Mexico has to stop allowing millions of people to pour into our country.”
Trump’s proposal has already picked-up steam amongst his most devoted allies in Washington, D.C. In some unspecified time in the future throughout Trump’s hourlong speech, Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene introduced that she’ll introduce a invoice to formally rename the Gulf of Mexico.
“President Trump’s second term is off to a GREAT start,” she posted to X.
x
President Trump’s second time period is off to a GREAT begin.
I’ll be introducing laws ASAP to formally change the title of the Gulf of Mexico to its rightful title, the Gulf of America! pic.twitter.com/uFlrNkw7c6
— Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene
(@RepMTG) January 7, 2025
Trump’s most up-to-date feedback about Mexico spotlight his continued concentrate on the nation as he prepares to start his second time period within the White Home. By proposing a reputation change, along with harping on his vainness initiatives to accumulate Canada, Greenland, and the Panama Canal, the president-elect appears to be reasserting his plans for U.S. sovereignty throughout the globe.
He wouldn’t be the primary to toy with renaming the Gulf of Mexico, nevertheless. In response to ABC Information, former Mississippi state Rep. Steve Holland, a Democrat, proposed a invoice in 2012 that may’ve renamed the gulf “the Gulf of America.”
Holland later admitted, nevertheless, that he was simply kidding and launched the laws as a joke to mock his Republican colleagues for being anti-immigrant.
Trump, who is thought for his racist and xenophobic remarks towards Mexicans, didn’t appear to be joking. That is even though the title “the Gulf of Mexico” truly predated the US. Because the St. Augustine Report famous, the title seems on maps way back to the sixteenth century.
Trump’s feedback made waves, partly, as a result of he’s at present in an ongoing—and really public—rift with Mexico’s management together with its president, Claudia Sheinbaum. Regardless of the 2 sharing a “wonderful” cellphone name in late November, they beforehand butted heads after Trump falsely claimed that Sheinbaum promised to shut her nation’s northern border with the US. (Sheinbaum has not publicly responded to Trump’s newest remarks.)
Certainly, any goodwill between Trump and Sheinbaum may be misplaced after Tuesday’s speech. In the identical tirade, he denounced Mexico as a “very dangerous place.”
“We have a massive deficit with Mexico,” Trump mentioned. “We help Mexico a lot. They’re essentially run by the cartels, can’t let that happen. Mexico’s really in trouble, a lot of trouble. Very dangerous place.”
Trump has complained in regards to the nation’s commerce deficit with each Mexico and China. Throughout his most up-to-date marketing campaign run, he raised considerations in regards to the challenge and has since promised to levy tariffs throughout the board, together with a 25% tariff on imports from Mexico.
Trump has an extended historical past of creating false, and oftentimes broad, pronouncements about Mexico’s administration of its facet of the border. However his feedback disparaging Mexico on Tuesday have been significantly notable, partly, as a result of the Mar-a-Lago information convention was supposed to share what was billed as excellent news.
Earlier than going off-script, Trump introduced a $20 billion funding in information facilities within the U.S. by Emirati billionaire Hussain Sajwani.
