Trump wants to rename the Gulf of Mexico

WASHINGTON —  Although President-elect Donald Trump will not take office for almost two weeks, he is already making his “America First” mantra a priority — and it may include other parts of the globe.

Trump proposed renaming the Gulf of Mexico and would not rule out using military force in Panama in a meandering news conference that touched on several fiery foreign policy points Tuesday.

‘All hell will break out in the Middle East’

Trump weighed in on the ongoing Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, promising to carry out vague threats if hostages are not returned to Israel by Inauguration Day.

“If they’re not back by the time I get into office, all hell will break out in the Middle East, and it will not be good for Hamas, and it will not be good, frankly, for anyone,” he said.

Dozens of people are still being held hostage in Gaza, 15 months after the Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel, when Hamas killed about 1,200 people and took about 250 others captive. Since then, Israel has blitzed Gaza and the West Bank, killing more than 45,000 Palestinians, according to local health authorities.

The United States has been negotiating with Israel and Hamas, as well as other regional states, to end the conflict and free the hostages for more than a year, and has made steady progress but has not concluded a deal. Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, said at the news conference Tuesday that he was traveling to Doha, Qatar’s capital, to continue negotiations, even though Trump’s administration does not take office for another two weeks.

“I think that we’ve had some really great progress, and I’m really hopeful that by the inaugural we’ll have some good things to announce on behalf of the president,” Witkoff said. It is not clear what actual authority Witkoff has before Trump becomes president.

‘Gulf of America’

As always, Trump’s focus quickly turned to the southern border, where he said the administration would rename the Gulf of Mexico to the “Gulf of America.”

“Which has a beautiful ring,” he said. “That covers a lot of territory, the Gulf of America. What a beautiful name. And it’s appropriate.”

The Gulf of Mexico covers the entire eastern coast of Mexico and stretches from the southernmost tip of Texas to the bottom of Florida. Trump reiterated that he planned to establish tariffs on Mexican goods, as a way to make the southern neighbor pay for allowing drugs and immigrants into the United States.

Trump’s tariff threats have sent a chill through Mexico’s leadership as President Claudia Sheinbaum, who took office Oct. 1, faces her first potential crisis.

The president has gone out of her way to try to convince the Trump team that Mexico is cracking down on fentanyl trafficking and illegal migration. But she has also had to navigate a delicate balancing act — not offending Trump while also standing up for Mexico’s sovereignty under the tariff threats, which, if implemented, experts say, could send Mexico into a deep recession and trigger retaliatory tariffs by Mexico against imports of U.S. goods.

Mexico is the United States’ largest trading partner, with back-and-forth trade exceeding $800 billion annually.

Sheinbaum announced a campaign against domestic usage of fentanyl in Mexico in her regular morning news conference earlier Tuesday. She reiterated her country’s efforts to curb production and distribution of fentanyl destined for U.S. markets.

“We are combating” the distribution of fentanyl, Sheinbaum told reporters, citing the recent seizure of more than 500,000 fentanyl pills — the largest such takedown in Mexico’s history — in the northwestern state of Sinaloa, a hub of fentanyl production and distribution.

Trump also ramped up his rhetorical broadsides against Mexico, asserting that Mexico “is essentially run by the cartels. …. Can’t let that happen. Mexico is really in trouble. A lot of trouble. Very dangerous place.”

Mexican authorities have repeatedly denied that cartels control the country, though security experts say that organized crime does hold sway over vast swaths of Mexican territory. Mexican officials have also rejected suggestions by Trump and allies of possible U.S. military strikes on cartel strongholds, and pushed back against the idea — occasionally floated by Trump and supporters — of designating Mexican cartels as terrorist organizations.

President-elect Donald Trump at Tuesday’s news conference.

(Evan Vucci / Associated Press)

Trump does not rule out using military in Panama or Greenland

The president-elect took aim at the Panama Canal, a recent frequent target of his. He alleged that the canal is in disrepair and that China should foot the bill to fix it, adding that the United States is charged more for using the trading waterway than other countries.

The U.S. is one of the largest users of the waterway, and fees, while lower than those tied to other canals such as the Suez, have gone up because of the drought afflicting much of Central America, exacerbated by human-caused climate change. Trump has falsely claimed Chinese soldiers are operating the canal, although it is true that China has made infrastructural and economic inroads in Panama and throughout the region.

“They’ve overcharged our ships, overcharged our Navy, and then when they need repair money, they come to the United States to put it up. We get nothing,” he said. “Those days are over.”

He also referred to annexing Greenland, an island with about 56,000 residents that is a territory of Denmark.

“We need Greenland for national security purposes,” Trump said. “I’m talking about protecting the free world. You don’t even need binoculars. You look outside, you have China ships all over the place. You have Russian ships all over the place. We’re not going to let that happen.”

Greenland’s prime minister quickly shot down any suggestions of a Trump takeover.

“Greenland belongs to the Greenlanders,” Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said, according to TV 2.

“As President, I want to express precisely that every square meter of the Panama Canal and its adjacent area belong to PANAMA, and will continue to be,” Panama President José Raúl Mulino said in a statement last month. “The sovereignty and independence of our country are not negotiable.”

When a reporter asked Trump on Tuesday whether he would commit to not using “military or economic coercion” in Panama or Greenland, Trump’s answer came swiftly: “No.”

Trump also added that negotiating Panama’s maintenance of the canal was one of the failed legacies of the late President Carter, whose funeral Trump is scheduled to attend this week. In fact, control of the canal that cuts across Panama — long a symbol of U.S. imperialism — was ended at the urging of the U.S. military, which said, long before Carter came to office, that maintaining and operating it was not sustainable. Carter’s decision was widely hailed and earned the U.S. great political capital throughout Latin America.

Pinho and Wilkinson reported from Washington, D.C. McDonnell reported from Mexico City.