[mothballed]

The constitution (article 11) of Mexico provides an explicit right of every person to enter Mexico without a passport (that doesn't mean every person in general -- you can be barred -- but not because you don't have a passport). You can witness this at land border crossings -- I routinely watch them let in foreigners without them (they're not following whatever uncited nonsense you read at the consulate wrongly claiming a passport is 'required' without citing any law). It is subject to immigration enforcement, but they're legally barred from requiring a passport. It won't do dick to stop delinquent people from leaving and anywhere that actually thoroughly checks passports also is a member of international child support enforcement treaties.

[defrost]

Interesting, never knew that.

As an aside I've been in and out of Mexico a bunch of times (formerly entered, 5 or 6 times; crossed the border, literally a hundred+ times) - but as an Australian geophysical exploration surveyor on the job it's always been via other people dealing with all the paperwork.

[antonvs]

You never knew that because most of it is false. The constitutional point they mentioned has a big exception for the needs of administration, and Mexico’s immigration law uses that to require passports from all foreign nationals entering Mexico. This has been upheld by Mexico’s Supreme Court.

[defrost]

Good to know.

I did my best to avoid all customs issues as I worked with a crew in and out of a lot countries for mapping and exploration and a lot of special exceptional visa work for the professional lawyer and government minister whisperer class.

Air geophysical survey grids 80m above ground level with 200m line spacing can have aircraft running lines backwards and forwards over a border for a couple of days.

[mothballed]

The constitutional challenge they speak of was a constitutional challenge by indigenous persons challenging internal immigration checkpoints. And the indigenous won, actually loosening immigration checks, so it's baffling they cited that. The ABA international even did a review of that case and the only relevant portions they mentioned were the loosening of internal immigration checkpoints.

>and Mexico’s immigration law uses that to require passports from all foreign nationals entering Mexico.

LMAO, this person must have never entered Mexico by land. You literally walk right in, 9 of 10 times. The last time I went even the X-ray machine guy was asleep. They're clearly following the constitution and not whatever hallucinated conclusion there was about the challenge by indigenous that loosened restrictions.

One time I showed my passport card, and they thought it was a driver license, lmao. Not that they gave a shit either way.