Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum clapped back Wednesday at President-elect Donald Trump’s threat to rename the Gulf of Mexico — saying the US should actually be called “Mexican America.” Trump, 78, announced Tuesday during a Mar-a-Lago press conference he had ambitions to rebrand the Gulf of Mexico to “Gulf of America.” In response, Sheinbaum, 62, showed off a 1607 map with the Gulf of Mexico being identified as such and North America labeled as Mexican America.
“Why don’t we call it Mexican America? It sounds nice, no?” asked the Mexican leader, apparently in jest. Sheinbaum added, “with all due respect,” that Trump was wrong to state that violent drug cartels are running Mexico, rather than “the people.” The Gulf of Mexico has been known as such for centuries, but Trump could go about trying to change how it would be labeled in the US.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) has already proposed a bill that would federally fund the required changes to maps.
The renaming would also cause a headache for the International Hydrographic Organization, which tries to ensure uniformity in how bodies of water are labeled. “We’re going to be changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America, which has a beautiful ring. That covers a lot of territory, the Gulf of America.
What a beautiful name and it’s appropriate,” Trump said Tuesday. During his remarks, Trump also mused about using the military to annex Greenland and the Panama Canal Zon.
