Trump's Mexico tariff threat was a 'sham' he finally gave up on after receiving major blowback: CNN contributor

On Friday, President Donald Trump announced that he had reached a deal with Mexico to reduce migration at the southern border, which he claimed averted the need to enact his 5 percent tariff on the country's goods — no doubt relieving the businesses and GOP lawmakers who were opposed to the plan.

But Democratic strategist Maria Cardona doesn't view this as a victory for Trump. As she said on CNN Saturday, it was yet another cave.

"I completely agree with Speaker Pelosi that this was, you know, governing by temper tantrum," said Cardona. "And frankly, I think it was a sham. I think that he threatened these tariffs and then he got a ton of blowback from the business community and his own Republican supporters and he had to figure a way out of it."

"And so I'm glad that Mexico and the United States are negotiating on this, but this is not the way to do this," Cardona continued. "This is indicative of a president who has never understood the issue of immigration at its core, and frankly I don't think he really cares about how this actually works and what the core problems are. If he did, he wouldn't shut off aid to the northern triangle countries, which is exactly what we need to be doing to fix the stability, to help them deal with violence and crime at the heart of the country so that these migrants don't come across."

"Look, this deal from what I understand is not going to work because now apparently, you know, originally Mexico was going to pay for a wall at our border, and now taxpayers are not only going to pay for this supposed wall with Mexico, but now we're going to pay for a wall between Guatemala and Mexico as well," said Cardona.

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