Trump traveled to Mexico City and met with Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto earlier Wednesday – but the two wound up telling different stories about their meeting.
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“We are united by our support for democracy, our love for our people, and the contributions of millions of Mexican Americans to the United States”, Trump said in Mexico City.
Trump laid out his tough immigration plans if he wins the November election against Democrat Hillary Clinton in a speech late Wednesday in the southwestern border state of Arizona, long one of the focal points of US efforts to stem the stream of illegal immigration into the USA from Mexico and Central America. In his Phoenix address, flagged as a major policy speech, Trump said that the only path to legal status for illegal immigrants was to leave and apply for re-entry.
While Trump did not commit to deporting an estimated 11-million undocumented immigrants now residing in the U-S., he made it clear that there will be no path to legal status for them.
Sen. Tim Kaine, the Democratic vice presidential candidate, today called Donald Trump a “diplomatic embarrassment” when asked on “Good Morning America” about the real estate mogul’s trip to Mexico Wednesday.
Kaine, campaigning in New Hampshire, cast Trump as gutless.
Talking tough, he riled up his supporters, calling for “zero tolerance” and immediate deportation of undocumented immigrants who are criminals and lobbing unfounded claims that President Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton backed “open borders”. “That is what it means to have laws”.
She says the kind words Trump spoke about Mexican Americans didn’t provide any consolation. “But when he looked President Peña Nieto in the eye, he couldn’t even bring that up”.
Did you catch Donald Trump’s big speech on immigration last night?
“We will build a great wall along the southern border”. Rep. Gohmert was not alone in thinking that the meeting went very well and that Trump did not choke when it came to getting Mexico to agree to pay for his proposed wall.
Raul Benitez Manaut, a professor at a Mexican university, slammed Trump’s visit to Mexico. He was ready to hear some of the ideas the advisory board had discussed in a meeting with Trump two weeks earlier. And he vowed to eliminate what he called the lure of legal status, something which he insisted draws hundreds of thousands of people into the US.
“The truth is, the central issue is not the needs of the 11 million illegal immigrants or however many there may be-and honestly we’ve been hearing that number for years”, Trump said before questioning the number of illegal immigrants in the United States.
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The San Francisco Chronicle reports that there now appears to be a new item of Trump campaign memorabilia: A “Make Mexico Great Again Also” hat.
