Mexico is threatening legal action against Google over Google Maps’ labeling of ‘Gulf of America,’ claiming the renaming oversteps U.S. jurisdiction.
Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum on Monday threatened to sue Google over its decision to display the name “Gulf of America” across the entire body of water rather than just the portion of the Gulf that lies within U.S. jurisdiction, arguing that the expansive naming violates Mexican sovereignty.
Sheinbaum’s announcement comes after weeks of escalating tensions between the Mexican government and the U.S. tech giant over its labeling of the Gulf on Google Maps. While people using the app in Mexico see “Gulf of Mexico,” those based in the United States now see “Gulf of America,” following a Jan. 20 decree issued by U.S. President Donald Trump to revise certain names of geographical features so that they “honor American greatness.”
At a press conference on Feb. 17, Sheinbaum said Mexico had formally asked Google to fully restore “Gulf of Mexico” as the primary name for the entire body of water, arguing that Trump’s renaming applied only to the U.S. continental shelf.
“We do not agree with this,“ Sheinbaum said of Google’s naming policy for the Gulf, adding that Mexico ”will wait for Google’s response and if not, we will proceed to court.”
The United States directly controls the waters of the Gulf approximately 12 nautical miles from its shores, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. It also maintains what is known as an exclusive economic zone stretching 200 miles offshore, where it can extract natural resources like oil. Mexico is arguing that the mapping policy violates Mexican sovereignty and that the United States only has jurisdiction over roughly half of the Gulf.
Mexican authorities previously asked Google to change its naming policy for the Gulf and, during the press conference, Sheinbaum shared a written response to the request from Cris Turner, Google’s vice president of government affairs and public policy.
Turner wrote in the Feb. 10 letter that Google’s decision to display the name Gulf of America to U.S.-based users is based on an impartial and consistent application of its maps policies across all regions, which involves using names that are prescribed by authoritative sources.
By Tom Ozimek
