Five Ways of Looking at Trump's Economic Coercion of Colombia

The Trump administration coerced Colombia. What does it mean?

Photo by Flavia Carpio on Unsplash

In his first week as president Donald Trump has threatened either economic sanctions or higher tariffs against — at a minimum — Canada, Mexico, Denmark, Russia, and China. On Sunday, however, for the first time in his second term Trump briefly imposed economic sanctions against another actor: Columbia University. [No, that was a typo—ed.] My apologies, the country of Colombia.

Why? I’ll turn this part over to the reporting team at the New York Times:

Colombia refused to accept U.S. military planes deporting immigrants, setting off a furious reaction from President Trump, who on Sunday announced a barrage of tariffs and sanctions targeting the country, which has long been a top U.S. ally in Latin America.

The United States will immediately impose a 25 percent tariff on all Colombian imports, and will raise them to 50 percent in one week, Mr. Trump said on social media.

The Trump administration will also “fully impose” banking and financial sanctions against Colombia, and will apply a travel ban and revoke visas of Colombian government officials, the president said.

Colombia’s leftist president, Gustavo Petro, also hit back at Mr. Trump. In one social media post, he announced retaliatory tariffs of 25 percent on U.S. imports to Colombia and in another, longer post he said those tariffs would hit 50 percent….

The immediate snag with the deportation flights appeared to be that U.S. military planes were transporting the undocumented migrants, a U.S. military official said on Sunday….

If the migrants were shifted to a commercial or charter flight, at least until diplomatic clearances had been settled for the government planes, the issue might resolve itself, said the military official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss operational matters.

President Petro’s remarks came in response to a post about the treatment of Brazilian deportees. Brazil’s foreign ministry complained of “degrading treatment” of its citizens after 88 migrants arrived in the country handcuffed on Friday and some complained of mistreatment after not being given water or allowed to use the bathroom during the flight.

A few hours later, however, the White House and Colombia announced a deal, with the White House stating, “The Government of Colombia has agreed to all of President Trump's terms, including the unrestricted acceptance of all illegal aliens from Colombia returned from the United States, including on U.S. military aircraft, without limitation or delay.” Colombia’s response suggests that this is at least mostly true.¹

What to think about all this? Reuters concludes: “Trump's punitive action demonstrated his more muscular U.S. foreign policy and his renewed willingness to force countries to bend to his will.” The hard-working staff here at Drezner’s World can think of few other ways to interpret this episode of coercive bargaining:

First, looking at this strictly from a sanctioning perspective, it’s not surprising that Trump got what he wanted. The demand is remarkably specific and narrow: allowing military as well as commercial aircraft to fly in migrants. Colombia has accepted regular migrant transfers via civilian aircraft for a long while now. The costs of the sanctions would have been high: a little more than a quarter of Colombia’s exports go to the United States, equivalent to four percent of its GDP. Remittances from the U.S. are also worth a few percentage points of Colombia’s GDP. These sanctions would have hit Colombia hard. The two countries have longstanding and warm bilateral ties. Petro is not a popular president. The combination of a specific demand, high costs to the target, low expectations of future conflict, and Petro’s domestic weakness led to a successful outcome for the United States.

Second, both countries were fortunate that the sanctions did not persist, because they would have incurred significant costs. The pain to Colombia from the sanctions was clear. The United States, however, relies on Colombian imports of coffee and cut flowers. Despite what Trump claims, Americans would have borne the brunt of any increase in prices. As Axios’ Ben Berkowitz warned when it seemed like the sanctions were going to be implemented, “American breakfasts suddenly risk getting a lot more expensive, even as Trump begins a new term with a promise to lower grocery prices.”

Third, Trump was playing for keeps with these sanctions: escalating tariffs, visa restrictions, enhanced customs and border inspections, and the promise of financial sanctions to come. This wasn’t a full embargo — but it’s close.

Why the overreaction? I can think of a few reasons:

• Trump’s poor impulse control and temper;

• Overreaction is what makes the news, and Trump wants to be seen as super-tough on immigration;

• This wasn’t just about Colombia — Mexico also refused a military plane. Trump did not want the entire region to resist his preferred optics on deportation. Which reminds me…

Fourth, this episode was a gift to China’s interests in the region. China will love to play the role of “black knight” in Latin America, providing an alternative source of demand and finance to the region. The more the United States acts like a regional bully, the more countries will start hedging ties by sidling up to China.

Fifth, and finally, the thing about economic sanctions is they can work in the short term and create problems down the road. In this case, Trump played his strongest hand against one of the weakest targets. It worked. For Trump, this might be a great precedent to set. For other countries in the region, they need to contemplate how to deal with an American president who says things like, “They need us much more than we need them. We don't need them. They need us. Everybody needs us.”

The question is whether the rest of the region decides to hang together or hang separately. A few years ago Victor Cha proposed a strategy of collective resilience to defend the Pacific Rim against Chinese economic coercion. I had my doubts about the idea but it was certainly intriguing. One has to wonder whether Latin American countries are now going to react to Trump’s indifference and coercive threats with some collective resilience of their own. And one also wonders what China might do to facilitate such resistance.

1. I would speculate that Colombia might have procured a U.S. assurance that the migrants on military planes not be shackled.