Trump’s Mexican border lunacy will not end well

How do you feel about paying for Donald Trump’s border wall, America?

Because if he builds it, you will pay. Mexico has flatly said it will not pay. And the cost of the border tax Trump has threatened to impose will simply be passed on to U.S. consumers.

That may be just fine with our tweeter-in-chief, but the American people should think twice. Trump’s obsession with undocumented immigrants and trade with Mexico, which played so well with the Republican base during the campaign, now must be translated into policy, and policy can have far-reaching consequences.

It wasn’t enough for Trump to announce construction of the wall; he took pains again to taunt the Mexican government. In other words, he felt it appropriate to humiliate a major trading partner, ally and neighbor.

When Trump suggested that agreeing to pay for the wall was a condition for an already planned meeting with President Enrique Peña Nieto, Peña called it off. Trump then escalated the drama by saying that Mexico would pay for the wall via a 20 percent tax on all imports.

Mexico is our third-largest trading partner. And many U.S. jobs are linked to its economy. Destabilization is liable to increase the number of people trying to migrate north, which has been at net zero for years now.

Moreover, imposing a 20 percent tax on Mexican goods could possibly start a trade war. And, as economist Paul Krugman suggests, it could just drive up the dollar’s value, ultimately erasing any competitive value it has for U.S. business. Details, details. Nevertheless, there is much Trump can do to inflict great harm on Mexico, simply because he wishes to. For instance, he could tax or restrict cash remittances. Millions of workers regularly send money to friends and family in Mexico — more than $25 billion last year. Stopping this flow would be disastrous to the Mexican economy.

Then again, it’s unclear that remittances could be stopped effectively. Trying to do so would just force people to use other channels, possibly even illegal ones. Do we want to create new problems for the sake of Trump’s ego?

Consider also the fight against drug trafficking. How willing will Mexico be to cooperate with us if Trump drives it to its knees?

Trump already has created a backlash with behavior in office that appears to be unhinged.

One key fact Trump doesn’t understand is that the America he is dreaming of is in direct conflict with the one that already exists.

Immigrants and their families are deeply entrenched in America. Mayors, police chiefs, legal scholars, refugee advocates, educators and everyday citizens have signaled their determination to resist his policies.

The optics will be awful if Trump tries to go after the “Dreamers,” people who were brought to the U.S. as children without documents. Trump will have to peel those people out of college classrooms.

Trump is set to learn that it’s not him that’s great. It’s the nation’s citizens, its constitution and laws, and its ethos and conscience, which are widely shared by everyday citizens.

And they are not about to let a fluke of one election cycle undermine the America they’ve worked so hard to build.