Mexico's new U.S. ambassador Roberto Lazzeri Montano faces a grueling balancing act as Washington's Trump-era threats and enforcement moves test the Mexico-U.S. relationship.
He must walk a line between protecting Mexican interests and containing border, trade and migration fallout, while rejecting any intervention that threatens Mexico's sovereignty. Trump threatened this week to double tariffs on Mexico if it did not stop a migrant caravan from reaching the border. He also repeated suggestions to send U.S. troops south of the border to pursue drug traffickers, raising sovereignty concerns. The ambassador has grappled with allegations of U.S. airstrikes that killed Mexican citizens and descriptions of such strikes as extrajudicial executions.