Mexico City —  Hardly a day goes by here that Mexico’s president or one of her aides does not speak of some plan being devised in case President-elect Donald Trump goes through with his threats of mass deportations and punishing tariffs — testament to how vulnerable Mexico is to shifting policies in Washington.

The latest from Mexico President Claudia Sheinbaum‘s administration is a “panic button” — an emergency cellphone application that will enable Mexican citizens fearing detention and deportation in the United States to alert diplomats and relatives of their plight.

Sheinbaum also says her government has bolstered staff at Mexico’s more than 50 consulates in the United States, adding advisors to provide legal counsel to those facing potential deportation.

Trump’s pronouncements have generated profound uncertainty among Mexican officials, business leaders on both side of the border and millions of Mexican immigrants in the United States.

Mexico’s president, Claudia Sheinbaum, has spoken out against President-elect Donald Trump’s deportation threats.

(Fernando Llano / Associated Press)

Sheinbaum, who calls Mexican migrants “heroes,” opposes Trump’s mass-deportation plan but has been muted in her criticisms of Trump himself.

Mexican nationals who could face deportation “are not alone and will not be alone,” Mexico’s foreign minister, Juan Ramón de la Fuente, vowed last month, speaking to reporters during one of Sheinbaum’s daily morning news conferences.

According to Mexican government estimates, some 4.8 million Mexicans reside in the United States illegally, by far the largest number among any nationality. Some have resided in the north for decades and have U.S.-born children, own homes and run businesses.

Trump and his representatives have offered no comprehensive details on how his deportation plan will take shape. Some aides have spoken of prioritizing roundups of undocumented immigrants with criminal records and pending deportation orders — longtime targets of U.S. immigration enforcement.

The U.S. House on Tuesday passed a bill that would target for deportation immigrants who are in the country illegally and have been charged with nonviolent crimes.

And some Trump proxies have not ruled out expanded raids in workplaces and sweeps in immigrant communities.

It’s unclear if Sheinbaum and her government hold out any hope that Trump’s deportation threats — a central pillar of his campaign — can be averted. Their public posture is to try to convince Trump of the importance of Mexican workers to key U.S. industries, including agriculture, meatpacking and the hospitality sector. But Trump and his allies have shown little sympathy for that argument.

Vulnerable Mexican citizens “need to know that they have rights,” Sheinbaum told reporters. “You can’t just deport a person, detain them, take them to the border. There are a series of legal procedures that need to be followed.”

Formal deportation cases can take months, even years, to resolve before immigration judges.

A legal assistance program for Mexicans residing in the United States now includes more than 300 advisors across Mexico’s 53 U.S. consulates, the government says, and also receives voluntary support from consultants and law firms.

Some critics question whether the Mexican government’s preparations will be effective, or if they’re really meant to be.

“The panic button, the stuff with the consulates — it’s all a smokescreen to give the impression of doing something in response to Trump,” said Irineo Mujica, who heads the Pueblo Sin Fronteras rights group. “Basically, they are going to give in to whatever Trump wants.”

The so-called panic-button app, to be fully rolled out this month, would allow citizens to alert officials at the nearest Mexican Consulate — as well as previously selected family members — of enforcement action targeting them, officials say.

Questions remain about how the app will work, and when it will become widely available. It will be simple to use and designed to be utilized if someone is facing “imminent detention,” De la Fuente said. Some immigration lawyers in Texas have launched a similar initiative, albeit of a smaller scale, and it has proved an effective tool, the foreign minister said.

“If someone is detained, independent of their migratory status, the most important thing is that the consulate is notified,” said De la Fuente. “This guarantees that the consulate is advised and we can make a quick reaction.”

According to the State Department, foreign nationals detained in the United States must be advised of the option of having the closest consulate or embassy notified. Immigrant advocates say arrested migrants are often not told of this option.

A deportation officer with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement conducts a briefing before an operation last month in the Bronx borough of New York.

(Julia Demaree Nikhinson / Associated Press)

People in immigration proceedings may hire attorneys, but they often cannot afford the fees — or may be unaware of how to go about finding counsel. Unlike criminal defendants, those detained for immigration violations have no right to court-appointed lawyers. Various studies have shown that having counsel greatly reduces the chances of someone being deported.

Mexican authorities, De la Fuente said, are also making “extensive efforts” to encourage compatriots in the United States with U.S.-born children to register their names and those of their children with consulates. One of the great fears of mass deportation is that sweeps could separate U.S.-citizen children from undocumented parents — or even result in the removal of U.S. citizen minors.

In Mexico, the migrant panic-button plan has been greeted with considerable skepticism. Some have noted that, in Mexico, authorities are often slow to respond to emergency calls reporting crimes or to the many fixed panic buttons in parks and other sites that are meant to summon police.

“Are Batman and Robin going to come to the rescue?” one person asked on social media after the government unveiled the app plan.

Also, many remain unconvinced that Mexican consulates — which, like other parts of the Mexican government, have seen budget cuts in recent years — will be much help in the face of sweeping deportations. Mujica said the consulates are often viewed with distrust by Mexican migrants. “They treat people like second-class citizens,” Mujica said.

Another element of Sheinbaum’s plan is to bolster aid for deportees removed to Mexican border cities and elsewhere in Mexico. “They will be received with social programs … and all the help they need,” Sheinbaum said, but she has provided few details.

Skeptics note that Mexican authorities have traditionally done little to assist Mexican nationals who are daily deported or otherwise repatriated to Mexico — beyond welcoming them and offering free or discounted bus fare back to their areas of origin.

Special correspondent Cecilia Sánchez Vidal in Mexico City contributed to this report.