Culture and Society
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Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has stated that her government is considering a possible civil lawsuit against Google for changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico on maps worldwide. The company changed the name to "Gulf of America" for users worldwide after declaring that it was not going to do so.
The rest of this article is behind a paywall. Please sign in or subscribe to access the full content.Speaking on Thursday, February 13, Sheinbaum pointed out that US President Donald Trump’s attempt at renaming the sea mass is not just limited politically but in jurisdiction, geographically. Trump declared he would change the name to the Gulf of America before he was inaugurated and signed an executive order to do so immediately after, but the naming should only apply to the US’s continental shelf as most of the Gulf of Mexico is under Mexican jurisdiction.
“We have sovereignty over our continental shelf,” Sheinbaum stated in a press conference as reported by Associated Press. Essentially, Trump can rename the US part but he can't change the name the rest of the world calls it.
The name Gulf of Mexico was first used in 1607, 169 years before the birth of the United States. It has been used for four centuries and is recognized at an International level. Sheinbaum made the point that the area of the United States used to be called Mexican America in the constitution of Apatzingán, the antecedent to Mexico’s first constitution; there’s a risk in unilaterally changing names.
"As we announced two weeks ago and consistent with our longstanding practices, we’ve begun rolling out changes to reflect this update," Google said in the update. "People using Maps in the U.S. will see 'Gulf of America,' and people in Mexico will see 'Gulf of Mexico.' Everyone else will see both names," a Google representative said in a statement.
In what has been called an attack on the freedom of the press, the Trump administration has barred Associated Press reporters from several events, as the news organization’s policy continues to use the Gulf of Mexico while stating Trump’s partial renaming of it.
