Meanwhile, Mexico was criticized for appearing to meddle in the US election process, and Pena Nieto was forced to repeatedly defend the decision to invite the candidates.
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A long-time aide, Videgaray managed Pena Nieto’s presidential campaign in 2012.
Pena Nieto was widely pilloried for hosting Trump at short notice last Wednesday after the NY businessman had underpinned much of his campaign on building a border wall that he said Mexico would pay for to stem illegal immigration.
“That’s how well we did”, Trump said during an NBC News presidential forum.
Analysts said the peso was little moved by the news, since Meade, a former finance minister, is seen by investors as a technocrat committed to reining in the country’s debt.
According to news reports, Trump’s lightning visit to Mexico was widely seen as a diplomatic failure that only served to strengthen the candidate’s standing among potential voters by making him seem more presidential.
An economist who earned a doctorate from the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Videgaray saw the meeting as a political risk worth taking in case Trump was elected, the Post said.
Donald Trump says that he had a “thoughtful and substantive” conversation with Mexico’s president on Wednesday as he kicks off a long-awaited speech on immigration.
Pena Nieto came under fire for not being hard on Trump during a joint news conference and failing to challenge him when the NY billionaire said they had not discussed the wall during their meeting.
But within hours of leaving Mexico, Trump was telling a cheering crowd of supporters in Arizona that Mexico would pay for the border wall “100%” prompting fresh ridicule of Pena Nieto at home. “It was necessary to make him feel and know why Mexico does not accept his positions”.
Trump met with Mexico’s president in Mexico City on August 31 and gave a joint press conference, where the construction mogul reiterated that he would build a wall on the border of both countries if he becomes president.
Videgaray, for his part, said in March “there is no scenario in which Mexico will pay” for the controversial barrier.
In contrast, Nieto tweeted, “At the start of the conversation with Donald Trump, I made it clear that Mexico will not pay for the wall”.
The president also invited Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton, who declined this week.
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