“We’re thinking in terms of 25% on Mexico and Canada because they’re allowing vast numbers of people” across the border, Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Monday night. “I think we’ll do it Feb. 1.”

During his inauguration address, Trump said, “Instead of taxing our citizens to enrich other countries, we will tariff and tax foreign countries to enrich our citizens.”

However, Trump did not include his 25% tariff plan, which he announced last year, in his slew of executive orders Monday.  

Instead, Trump signed an executive action that plans for the Commerce, Treasury, and the United Trade Representative to investigate the source of America’s trade deficits with foreign nations. He is also looking to create an “External Revenue Service” to collect tariffs and to flag unfair trade practices. 

Trump threatened both Canada and Mexico with a 25% tariff in an effort to get foreign leaders to crack down on illegal immigration and the flow of drugs from their countries into the United States. 

In 2024, U.S. Border Patrol had a million encounters with illegal border crossers at the U.S.-Mexico border, and 22,369 encounters along the northern border. The U.S. border service also seized about 20,600 pounds of fentanyl at the southern border and 50 pounds at the northern border, data show.

When Trump made the 25% tariff announcement last year, it prompted Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who has since announced his resignation, to visit Trump, then-president-elect, at Mar-a-Lago to soothe Trump’s concerns on illegal border crossings. Meanwhile, Mexico President Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo promised retaliation, warning that Trump’s trade war would cause job losses and inflation for both countries.

“One tariff will follow another in response and so on, until we put our common businesses at risk,” Sheinbaum said in a letter to Trump. 

However, both Mexico and Canada, in response to Trump’s tariff threats, have been making strides to crack down on immigration and the flow of illicit narcotics. Mexico is reducing its imports from China and has seized a record-breaking number of fentanyl pills. Meanwhile, Canada has presented a billion-dollar plan to combat problems along the northern border.

Trump’s tariff threats come as the three North American countries are set to negotiate the terms of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement in 2026.