Donald Trump is reportedly weighing a possible trip to Mexico to meet with President Enrique Peña Nieto – the same day he is set to make a long-awaited speech on immigration, The Washington Post reported on Tuesday.
Advertisement
Pena Nieto’s office released a statement saying he had invited Trump as well as Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton to meet with him in Mexico, but “there is no confirmation of meetings at this point”, CNN reported.
The recent tweaks to Trump’s tone have included a change from insisting on removing millions of the undocumented to promising deportations of those immigrants with criminal records.
“I invited Mexico to the US presidential candidates, to discuss bilateral relations”.
The invitation is a stunning move by Peña Nieto, given the grief that Trump’s campaign has caused the Mexican government over the past year. The visit comes as the Mexican president faces an approval rating of just 23%, the lowest recorded since he took office in December 2012.
“I’d meet with him”, Trump said of Nieto.
The meeting will come hours before he attends a rally where Trump is expected to clarify – once and for all – his stand on immigration and how he plans to deal with people in the United States illegally. Trump says he will force Mexico to pay for the wall.
Trump’s campaign manager Kellyanne Conway said on “Fox News Sunday” that Trump wants to find “the fair and humane way” to address the issue, which includes whether to separate families to enforce federal law. They said earlier Tuesday that talks between the Trump campaign and Mexican officials were ongoing, with security concerns still being sorted out.
Clinton’s campaign has urged voters to not “be fooled” by what it calls Trump’s attempts to disguise his immigration policies.
Trump’s short stop in Mexico marks his first campaign visit to a foreign country.
Advertisement
Immigration is considered Trump’s signature platform, from his promise to build the wall to his controversial, but wavering stance on deportation strategies. On Tuesday, Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway said categorically that Trump opposes any path to legal status for the 11 million people in the US illegally-and would instead empower law enforcement to ramp up deportations.
