On Wednesday, Trump flew to Mexico City and held an hour of talks with Mexican President Enrique Pena-Nieto, where they discussed a range of issues including commerce and border security.
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But it did enter the discussion because Pena Nieto said he brought up the wall and Trump’s payment claim right off the bat.
Unlike this president, though, Trump says there should be no path to legalization for these longtime immigrants, short of returning to their home countries and reapplying for admission. He would build a wall – a “beautiful, impenetrable” wall, tunnel-proof, with towers and aerial surveillance. “That will be for a later date”. Trump said it didn’t come up in his meeting Wednesday with Peña Nieto. He responded to Trump on Twitter by saying, “Repeating what I told you in person, Mexico will never pay for a wall”.
“As a candidate, Donald Trump has already embarrassed us on the world stage”. Cable news anchors became absolutely giddy with speculation about Trump’s “new” look on immigration. He is right that we have to deport unsafe criminals who are here illegally, and crack down severely on any business that illegally employs undocumented workers.
Olmo agrees with Trump’s plan to triple the number of ICE officers, deport criminal aliens and demand extreme vetting of people applying for visas.
Before Trump declared his presidential candidacy a year ago, he sought out a small band of hardcore conservative strategists to come up with a package of issues that would catapult him to the frontrunner in the race.
Trump did back away from his previous vow to round up and deport all 11 million undocumented immigrants living in the US. His sometimes divisive rhetoric has also alienated large numbers of Hispanic voters, according to numerous public opinion polls.
Trump appeared to be undeterred by any disagreement with Pena Nieto prior to his speech in Arizona, tweeting upon his return to the US that Mexico had “wonderful leadership and high quality people”. Trump did not express any regrets for his comments, and was only mildly reprimanded by Pena Nieto, who said, “The Mexican people felt aggrieved by those comments”, but felt Trump has a “genuine interest in building a relationship that would lead us to provide better conditions to our people”. “One hundred percent. They don’t know it yet but they’re going to pay for it”. Trump and some Trump surrogates have used different words, such as “humane” and “compassionate”, in regards to immigration in recent weeks.
It didn’t quite work, for while his speech in Phoenix did contain valid points, it also painted us as a fearful nation besieged by violent, thieving, benefit-sucking hordes of immigrants here illegally, which simply isn’t true.
The Virginia senator questioned the odds that Trump would have avoided saying anything about who would pay for the border wall while mocking the conflicting accounts over whether the wall came up during the sit-down.
“I think there was an advance in general”, he added.
Who will pay for the wall?
However, Trump’s gains from the meeting far outweigh its perceived shortcomings, Schirach maintained.
While it’s not surprising that some Latinos would support a Republican candidate, “it would be interesting to see if this changes as a result of the (immigration) speech and the abandonment of these conservative Latinos who were defending Trump until now”, Pastor said.
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“Hillary Clinton has massive flaws”, said Jeremy Mayer, an assistant professor of government at George Mason University in Virginia.
