Report by Safarti Tarjuman International Desk

Mexico has filed a lawsuit against Google over the renaming of the Gulf of Mexico to the “Gulf of America” for users in the United States, President Claudia Sheinbaum confirmed during her Friday morning press briefing. The legal action follows mounting tensions sparked by a U.S. legislative move to formalize the controversial name change.

The decision comes one day after Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives approved a bill to adopt the “Gulf of America” name, a measure spearheaded by Republican lawmaker Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia. The bill passed mostly along party lines, with Democrats opposing and nearly all Republicans supporting it—except for Representative Don Bacon of Nebraska.

Mexico’s legal complaint stems from Google’s implementation of the name change on its U.S. version of Google Maps, which the Mexican government argues misrepresents internationally recognized geographical terminology. In February, Sheinbaum had already warned Google, a subsidiary of Alphabet Inc., that legal action would be considered if the company did not reverse its change.

President Sheinbaum clarified that The U.S. government only refers to its own territorial waters as the Gulf of America. It does not have the authority to rename the entire gulf.

In a pointed rebuttal, Sheinbaum sarcastically suggested that Mexico could begin referring to the U.S. as “América Mexicana” (Mexican America), referencing pre-1848 maps from before Mexico lost a significant portion of its territory to the United States.

This legal dispute unfolds amid broader diplomatic friction between the two countries, particularly over ongoing trade tensions and recent tariff policies initiated by Donald Trump. Talks are currently underway between U.S. and Mexican officials in hopes of de-escalating the situation.