Trump says US has reached deal with Mexico on immigration

President Trump said Friday evening the U.S. had reached a deal with Mexico and he “indefinitely suspended” impending tariffs on imports.

Trump said Mexico agreed to implement “strong measures” to decrease migration through Mexico to the United States’ southern border.

“This is being done to greatly reduce, or eliminate, Illegal Immigration coming from Mexico and into the United States,” he said in a tweet.

Those measures included Mexico deploying its national guard to its southern border, according to a joint declaration released by the State Department. The agreement allows the U.S. to “rapidly” return asylum seekers to Mexico, where they will be offered jobs, healthcare, and education while their asylum claims are being processed. The U.S. said it would work to accelerate the processing of asylum claims.

“We would like to thank Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard for his hard work to negotiate a set of joint obligations that benefit both the United States and Mexico. The United States looks forward to working alongside Mexico to fulfill these commitments so that we can stem the tide of illegal migration across our southern border and to make our border strong and secure,” said Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in a statement.

The Trump administration was set to impose a 5% added tax on all Mexican imports beginning Monday if a deal was not reached to stem the flow of Central American migrants crossing into the U.S.

Congress had warned that the tariffs could harm the U.S. economy.