PNTR And Other Diplomatic Courtesies ARE A PRIVILEGE

January 27, 2025 by Karl Denninger

There is no "right" to international trade or the capacity for your nationals to enter and remain in any given nation under any specific set of circumstances, ever, period. That's what "national sovereignty" IS.

We have reports that Mexico refusing landing permission for a repatriation flight of Mexican citizens who were being deported. There is dispute over whether this was a "miscommunication" (e.g. Mexico refused but the reason was they believed the persons on board were not Mexican) or whether it was actually a refusal to take back their own people.

If its a miscommunication then let's see that flight leave once its resolved, which I would presume it was and did in fact depart to Mexico on a rapid basis.

But if it is in fact a refusal to accept one's own citizens back into their nation, and this should apply to any nation, then the price of that must be an immediate embargo and closure of the border, rescission of all visas including for those nationals already here, a complete lockdown on trade and monetary flows along with an immediate freeze and expropriation of any assets held by any national, whether a person or corporation, domiciled in that country that happen to be in the United States.

If you won't take your own citizens back then all of your citizens who are here and all your corporate interests are immediately and summarily deemed illegally present, ordered to leave and all of their assets are forfeit. Nobody, whether a natural person or corporate entity, has a right to be present in a nation other than that of their citizenship; that is a privilege.

I don't care how someone gets here (or into any other nation); the responsibility of a sovereign is to accept their own citizens if they're kicked out of wherever they are, whether that expulsion is for good cause or not.

Mexico wants to play the "oh but your businesses will scream" game? Yes, they will. But this risk is one that they should have evaluated and if they didn't that's their problem. Part of a firm's decision to put manufacturing or other facilities in another country must include an evaluation of the risk that said nation will refuse legitimate responsibilities that attach to any sovereign and if they do those sort of things their assets may be devalued, damaged or even destroyed and there will be nothing they can do about it.

If Ford, GM and others didn't make such an evaluation that's their problem and they can take it up with the Mexican Government and secure whatever sort of guarantees the government is willing to offer and whatever means of enforcement they believe are sufficient. That's what business is; figuring out risk and reward for a given action, mitigating whatever risk you can and accepting which you cannot -- or choosing to put your facility somewhere else.

No nation can be allowed to refuse their own citizens back if expelled from somewhere -- no matter from and why they were expelled. If you do that as a nation, irrespective of circumstance, the price must be the immediate shutdown of all commerce, all trade with, all money flows and anything any of your nationals own in the nation demanding repatriation is forfeit.

Period.