Very interesting debate here. I too have always thought that Mexico would get nuked in the Twilight War after the Mexican Army crosses the border with Division Cuba. It's the degree of the U.S. strike that's the question, ranging from a full-blown attack (i.e. nuke every Spanish-speaking person between the Rio Grande and the Yucatan) to a targeted one (hit the rail hubs, the troop concentrations, supply junctions, the Mexican government in Mexico City etc.) and watch the Mexican Army and Division Cuba quickly run out of gas and supplies and disintegrate in a wave of mass desertions and surrenders.
As others have already pointed out, the JCS would have various things to take into account. First of all the total annihilation option is out, because at the end of the day Mexico isn't the USSR/Russia. You don't really need THAT many nukes to render Mexico harmless. And it's quite obvious that not everyone in Mexican political and military circles would support this mad scheme anyway. Also, the JCS has to take into account that any nukes too close to the border would potentially also endanger Americans with the fallout. Also, nuking your worst opponent in retaliation for his nuking you is different from nuking a country without nukes. Having said that, I do add the caveat that certain other non-nuclear countries would have also been hit hard (e.g. Canada and Japan).
That being said, it's also out of the question that the JCS would withhold from using nukes at all to stop the Mexican advance. The Mexican government has essentially stabbed the U.S. in the back. The nuclear strikes of Nov./Dec. 1997 have decimated the U.S. military and U.S. forces in America are stretched thin as it is. They have no way of conventionally stopping the Mexican advance. Any prior reluctance in using nukes is out the window as the nuclear genie hasn't just been let out of the bottle, it's been smashed out of the bottle. So nukes is what they'll use, against the Mexican military, transportation hubs and the Mexican government. There will be an attempt to avoid excessive civilian deaths, but it has to be said that with the nukes, the civil war, famine, epidemics and general political and social breakdown that Mexico will be just as worse off as the U.S., if not even more so.
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