Trump Calls Off Plan to Impose Tariffs on Mexico – The New York Times

At the same time, Mr. López Obrador, who was elected on a promise to transform Mexico, tackling poverty and inequality, has big, expensive ambitions.

He has doubled pensions for the elderly, granted stipends to unemployed youth, paid a princely sum to cancel a new airport project started by his predecessor and vowed to build a new oil refinery. More broadly, he has promised to rescue the ailing state-run oil company Petróleos Mexicanos, or Pemex, which has racked up an astounding $100 billion in debt.

The fight with his giant neighbor risked plunging his country into an economic crisis that would endanger those plans.

Before the deal was made, Mr. López Obrador had called on Mexicans to rally on Saturday in the border city of Tijuana to both defend the dignity of Mexico and, at the same time, celebrate its friendship with the United States. On Friday night, he tweeted that the rally would go on as planned.

The agreement that Mr. Trump announced ended — at least for now — an escalation of the trade wars that the United States has waged against other countries, like China.

The new levies would have raised the cost of a wide array of products imported from Mexico, including cars, cucumbers, bluejeans, packaged food and chemicals. Mr. Trump had warned that he was prepared to ramp tariffs up each month until they hit 25 percent in October.

That would have been a drastic cost increase for the United States’ current largest trading partner, one that could have significantly increased prices for American consumers and ruptured long-established supply chains.