Mexican President-elect Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador announced this week that he plans to travel without armed guards and claims that the people will protect him, even as the country has been rocked by scores of political assassinations over the past several months.
President Enrique Pena Nieto reportedly offered Lopez Obrador federal protection until he takes office, but he declined, saying, &#8220;The people will protect me. &#8230; He who fights for justice has nothing to fear.&#8221;
Lopez Obrador, who is commonly referred to as &#8220;AMLO,&#8221; also told a large crowd of supporters: &#8220;You&#8217;ll all be watching out for me.&#8221;
<a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mexico-politics-security/mexicos-president-elect-shuns-guards-asks-people-for-protection-idUSKBN1JU04E">Reuters</a> reports that the president-elect&#8217;s approach to security &#8220;is one of the first signs of how he is breaking from the mold of the typical Mexican presidency.&#8221;
The International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2017/05/09/americas/mexico-second-deadliest-conflict-2016/index.html">ranked</a> Mexico as the second deadliest country in the world in 2016 as Mexico&#8217;s drug wars claimed approximately 23,000 lives that year.
The number of murders in Mexico <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/mexico-record-homicide-rate-1.4497466">skyrocketed</a> in 2017 to over 29,000. Reuters notes that the nation is on track to have an even bloodier year in 2018.
Etellekt, a risk analysis firm, <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2018/06/27/americas/mexico-political-deaths-election-season-trnd/index.html">reported</a> this week that 132 politicians were killed in the nine months leading up to last weekend&#8217;s presidential election.
&#8220;These numbers anticipates a serious challenge of security for peace and democratic governance in these regions, and could debilitate the political party,&#8221; Etellekt said.

Mexico’s New President Announces Absolutely Insane Plan Before Taking Office

Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador

Mexico

Pena Nieto

Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto has reportedly canceled a planned trip to visit the White House after a &#8220;testy&#8221; phone call with President Donald Trump over a proposed wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, The Washington Post reported.
&#8220;One Mexican official said Trump &#8216;lost his temper.&#8217; But U.S. officials described him instead as being frustrated and exasperated, saying Trump believed it was unreasonable for Peña Nieto to expect him to back off his crowd-pleasing campaign promise of forcing Mexico to pay for the wall,&#8221; the Post said.
Peña Nieto had demanded that Trump publicly state that Mexico would not be paying for the wall &#8212; reneging on a promise Trump made throughout the 2016 presidential campaign. Trump said no. Neither man would budge on his position during the 50-minute phone call, so the Mexican president canceled his trip.
The move is political, as Peña Nieto faces a re-election bid in July. If he was seen as caving to Trump&#8217;s demand, he would face a tough time with voters and supporters in his Institutional Revolutionary Party.
<blockquote>
The two presidents&#8217; public posturing over the wall &#8212; Trump demands that Mexico pay for it; Peña Nieto insists that it will not &#8212; has harmed their personal relationship and jeopardized the alliance between their neighboring countries.
&#8220;The problem is that President Trump has painted himself, President Peña Nieto and the bilateral relationship into a corner,&#8221; said Arturo Sarukhan, a former Mexican ambassador to the United States. &#8220;Even from the get-go, the idea of Mexico paying for the wall was never going to fly. His relationship with Mexico isn&#8217;t strategically driven. It&#8217;s not even business; it&#8217;s personal, driven by motivations and triggers, and that&#8217;s a huge problem. It could end up with the U.S. asking itself, &#8216;Who lost Mexico?&#8217;&#8201;&#8221;
Still, negotiations between their respective administrations continue apace on the North American Free Trade Agreement and other issues. And both governments have strived to portray their ties as strong and the exchanges between their leaders as smooth.
</blockquote>
In a readout of the phone call provided by the White House, there was no mention of any dispute. Instead, the White House said &#8220;President Trump underscored his commitment to expanding cooperation between the United States and Mexico on security, trade, and immigration.&#8221;
This is the second time the visit of a leader from America&#8217;s southern neighbor has not followed through on a trip. In January 2017, Trump told Peña Nieto he wouldn&#8217;t meet with him if he was going to say that Mexico would not pay for the wall. Instead, in that phone call Trump urged Peña Nieto to say, &#8220;We will work it out.&#8221;
&#8220;The fact is we are both in a little bit of a political bind because I have to have Mexico pay for the wall &#8212; I have to,&#8221; Trump said, according to the Post. &#8220;I have been talking about it for a two-year period, and the reason I say they are going to pay for the wall is because Mexico has made a fortune out of the stupidity of U.S. trade representatives.&#8221;

Mexico’s President Cancels White House Visit After Argument With Trump Over Border Wall

Donald Trump

Washington Post

On Wednesday, Reuters reported that Mexican cement company Grup Cementos (GCC) has offered to build president-elect Donald Trump&#8217;s &#8220;big, beautiful wall&#8221; along the southern border of the United States. 
&#8220;We can&#8217;t be choosy,&#8221; Enrique Escalante, chief executive of the company <a href="http://thehill.com/blogs/in-the-know/in-the-know/307463-mexican-cement-company-offers-to-build-trumps-wall">told</a> Reuters. &#8220;We&#8217;re an important producer in that area and we have to respect our clients on both sides of the border.&#8221;
&#8220;For the business we&#8217;re in, Trump is a candidate that does favor the industry quite a bit,&#8221; Escalante added.
<blockquote>
&#8220;For the business we&#8217;re in, Trump is a candidate that does favor the industry quite a bit.&#8221;
Enrique Escalante, Grup Cementos CEO
</blockquote>
GCC is one of the largest construction materials company in Mexico, The Hill <a href="http://thehill.com/blogs/in-the-know/in-the-know/307463-mexican-cement-company-offers-to-build-trumps-wall">reports</a>. Based in Chihuahua, Mexico, GCC routinely provides materials for projects in neighboring Texas and New Mexico, maintaining a good relationship with American construction and building companies in the the Southwest United States. With three plants in the U.S., GCC produces around 70 percent of its sales north of the border.
On the campaign trail, Trump promised to build a, &#8220;big, beautiful, powerful&#8221; wall that would stretch across the 2,000-mile border between the U.S. and Mexico in order to keep out illegal immigrants.
While critics have long argued that such a feat is nearly impossible, and would add billions to the national debt, Trump has vowed to keep his campaign promise to build &#8220;the wall,&#8221; which sits at the cornerstone of Trump&#8217;s immigration agenda. Millions of Americans are expecting Trump&#8217;s wall to be up in the next four years.

Mexican Cement Company to Trump: We’ll Build Your Wall

Illegal Immigration

Immigrants

Immigration

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)

Republican Party

Trump Administration

On Wednesday, The Wall Street Journal <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/mexicos-finance-minister-resigns-in-wake-of-trump-visit-1473258840">reported</a> that Mexican Finance Minister Luis Videgaray, the man who personally orchestrated Donald Trump&#8217;s impromptu meeting with President Enrique Peña Nieto, in Mexico City has resigned. This comes just one week after the high-profile trip.
Videgaray didn&#8217;t provide a clear reason for his departure, although the chorus of condemnation by the Mexican media following Trump&#8217;s visit may have something to do with it.
Domestic politics may have been at play as well. &#8220;The resignation also came before Videgaray was set to present Mexico&#8217;s 2017 budget, after pledging to send the country to a surplus for the first time since 2008,&#8221; <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2016/09/mexico-finance-minister-resigns-trump-227832">reports</a> Politico.
Replete with corruption and mismanagement, the incredibly unpopular Nieto government has failed to deliver on one promise after another, especially with regard to economic recovery. 
In June, the <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/mexicos-economy-shrinks-in-second-quarter-1469799594">Mexico experienced its first contraction in GDP in nearly three years</a>. The second quarter report detailed a sharp decline in domestic production, especially in the oil sector, as well as unimpressive foreign investment numbers.
According to Politico, Videgaray was Nieto&#8217;s right-hand man, a reliable ally in government.
The finance minister will be replaced by Jose Antonio Meade, Mexico&#8217;s Social Development Minister.

Mexican Gov’t Official Who Organized Trump Trip Sponatenously Resigns

In the wake what even Trump&#8217;s most ardent critics are <a href="http://www.dailywire.com/news/8813/trumps-big-win-mexico-face-face-leaves-trump-ben-shapiro">calling</a> a &#8220;successful&#8221; and &#8220;presidential&#8221; meeting, Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto may have just spoiled the party. Late Wednesday, a spokesman for the president&#8217;s office reaffirmed Mexico&#8217;s refusal to submit to Trump&#8217;s wall proposal.
Peña Nieto himself sent out this tweet shortly after his meeting with Trump in case there were still any doubts (translation provided):

<div class="image"><img decoding="async" loading="lazy" alt class="media-element file-default" data-fid="11487" data-media-element="1" height="488" src="https://dw-wp-dev.imgix.net/2019/09/screen_shot_2016-08-31_at_5.33.24_pm.jpg" width="1184" /></div>
&#8220;At the beginning of the conversation with Donald Trump, I made clear that Mexico will not pay for the wall,&#8221; he asserted.
Peña Nieto&#8217;s unequivocal statement directly contradicts what Trump told reporters hours earlier.
&#8220;We did discuss the wall, we didn&#8217;t discuss payment of the wall,&#8221; Trump <a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2016-election/trump-meets-mexican-president-skips-border-wall-negotiations-n640856">stated</a>, standing an arm&#8217;s-length away from the Mexican president. &#8220;That will be for a later date.&#8221;
At the time, Peña Nieto failed to correct Trump or challenge his narrative of what transpired during their closed-door meeting. Instead, Peña Nieto waited until Trump left, issuing an ex post facto response behind the screen of a computer.
Following Peña Nieto&#8217;s clarification (or provocation, depending on how you look at it), the Trump campaign then issued a counter-response, brushing aside his perspective.
&#8220;Today was the first part of the discussion and a relationship builder between Mr. Trump and President Peña Nieto. It was not a negotiation, and that would have been inappropriate,&#8221; <a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2016-election/trump-meets-mexican-president-skips-border-wall-negotiations-n640856">said</a> campaign spokesman Jason Miller in a statement. &#8220;It is unsurprising that they hold two different views on this issue, and we look forward to continuing the conversation.&#8221;
What began as a relatively cordial meeting has devolved into a game of he said, she said and we said.
In effect, Trump&#8217;s initial assertion that payment for the wall was not &#8220;discussed&#8221; is being undermined by two parties, Peña Nieto himself and Trump&#8217;s campaign spokespeople. We saw the same thing happen during the back-and-forth between Trump and his children about his &#8220;softened&#8221; position on deportations. Despite the post-meeting quarrel, however, the initial &#8220;presidential&#8221; optics of the event have probably helped Trump in the long run. 
<div> </div>

screen_shot_2016-08-31_at_5.33.24_pm

Mexican President To Trump: ‘I Made Clear That Mexico Will Not Pay For The Wall.’

After Donald Trump met with Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto on Wednesday, he claimed at a press conference that the two men had discussed the wall Trump has proclaimed he will build on the U.S./Mexico border, but not Trump&#8217;s oft-repeated claim that he would make Mexico pay for it. A reporter had questioned Trump whether the two men had discussed who would pay for the wall; Trump replied, &#8220;Who pays for the wall? We didn&#8217;t discuss. We did discuss the wall. We didn&#8217;t discuss payment of the wall. That&#8217;ll be for a later date.&#8221;
Hours later, Nieto issued a denial of Trump&#8217;s claim, tweeting: &#8220;At the start of the conversation with Donald Trump, I made it clear that Mexico will not pay for the wall.&#8221;
<div class="media_embed">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
Al inicio de la conversación con Donald Trump dejé claro que México no pagará por el muro.
&#8212; Enrique Peña Nieto (@EPN) <a href="https://twitter.com/EPN/status/771118159654891520">August 31, 2016</a></blockquote>
</div>
In addition, although Jason Miller, Trump&#8217;s senior communications adviser, responded to Nieto&#8217;s tweet that the meeting was &#8220;the first part of the discussion and a relationship builder &#8230; It was not a negotiation, and that would have been inappropriate. It is unsurprising that they hold two different views on this issue, and we look forward to continuing the conversation,&#8221; later in the day, the Mexican Foreign Ministry fired back:
<div class="media_embed">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
Mexican foreign minister says her president expressed Mexicans&#8217; grave indignation for Trump&#8217;s insults and offenses&#8212;&gt; <a href="https://t.co/XK2ea0mU4j">https://t.co/XK2ea0mU4j</a>
&#8212; Blake Hounshell (@blakehounshell) <a href="https://twitter.com/blakehounshell/status/771138925276659716">September 1, 2016</a></blockquote>
</div>
<blockquote>
&#8220;At the start of the conversation with Donald Trump, I made it clear that Mexico will not pay for the wall.&#8221;
Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto
</blockquote>
Why Nieto chose to wait hours to respond to Trump&#8217;s claim is anyone&#8217;s guess; he was present at the news conference when Trump made his claim. Nieto told <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/10/world/mexico-president-fareed-interview/">CNN&#8217;s Fareed Zakaria</a> in July &#8220;there is no way that Mexico can pay (for) a wall like that.&#8221;
The two men also differed over NAFTA; Nieto lauded NAFTA, pointing out that over six million US jobs rely on exports to Mexico. He asserted, &#8220;I don&#8217;t think that commerce must be considered a zero sum game, so that only one wins and the other one loses.&#8221; Trump countered that the &#8220;tremendous outflow&#8221; of jobs from the United States into Mexico had to stop, arguing that NAFTA benefited Mexico more than the U.S.

Late Hit: Nieto Says He Told Trump To Stick It On Wall

Standing alongside Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump told reporters at a press conference Wednesday that he &#8220;didn&#8217;t discuss&#8221; the financial dimension of his highly-publicized &#8220;wall&#8221; proposal at his meeting in Mexico City. &#8220;Who&#8217;s going to pay for the wall? We didn&#8217;t discuss that,&#8221; stated Trump.
While Trump did say he discussed the need for a border between Mexico and the United States, he confessed that it&#8217;s actually a &#8220;shared responsibility&#8221; between the two countries. The real estate mogul&#8217;s &#8220;softened&#8221; tone here seems to contradict what he&#8217;s been telling his supporters since the first day he announced his candidacy. 
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
the wall would be a &#8220;shared&#8221; responsibility, Trump says in Mexico City, which doesn&#8217;t sound an awful lot like Mexico would pay for it
&#8212; Edward-Isaac Dovere (@IsaacDovere) <a href="https://twitter.com/IsaacDovere/status/771082218936688642">August 31, 2016</a></blockquote>
Attend any Trump rally and you&#8217;re guaranteed to hear the Republican nominee repeatedly shout one question at the crowd: Who&#8217;s going to pay for the wall? In unison, hundreds of passionate supporters enthusiastically yell back: Mexico! It&#8217;s become something of a Trumpian ritual at these overcrowded rallies. 
In fact, the &#8220;big, beautiful wall&#8221; appeared to be the only constant in Trump&#8217;s &#8220;flexible&#8221; immigration policy. From day one, Trump used this &#8220;wall&#8221; as a both a literal manifestation of his uncompromising views on illegal immigration and a metonymic device meant to stand in for his impregnable anti-PC strength over his &#8220;weakling,&#8221; &#8220;low-energy,&#8221; and &#8220;little&#8221; primary opponents. It worked. He managed to rally his base and galvanize immigration hard liners. 
Visit his campaign website today and you&#8217;ll see a detailed breakdown of how much Mexico will be &#8220;compelled&#8221; to pay a future Trump administration to construct the wall.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
Trump website claims it&#8217;s an &#8220;easy decision&#8221; for Mexico to pay for wall. Now says they didn&#8217;t even discuss it?! <a href="https://t.co/VYL0YSazNm">pic.twitter.com/VYL0YSazNm</a>
&#8212; igorvolsky (@igorvolsky) <a href="https://twitter.com/igorvolsky/status/771083784141799425">August 31, 2016</a></blockquote>
Perhaps a more &#8220;presidential&#8221; Trump showed up on Wednesday, one that was willing to abandon the hyperbole for &#8220;establishment Republican&#8221; moderation and compromise. Or maybe we saw &#8220;humane&#8221; Trump?
Either way, expect his campaign officials and/or children to deny his unmistakable shape-shifting and repeat the phrase &#8220;nothing has changed&#8221; like a broken record.

Trump: WHO’S GOING TO PAY FOR THE WALL? … ‘We Didn’t Discuss That’

There&#8217;s been a lot of entertaining plot twists this election cycle, but Donald Trump&#8217;s impromptu meeting with Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto in Mexico has to be one of the most fantastically unexpected events yet. 
The meeting comes as the Republican nominee looks to &#8220;soften&#8221; his immigration stance in in order to attract Hispanic and Latino voters as well as wary independent that may still be on the fence (pun-intended). Apparently, calling Mexicans &#8220;rapists&#8221; hasn&#8217;t translated to high polling numbers in the general election. 
While Trump&#8217;s motives for accepting a meeting south of the border are relatively clear, President Peña Nieto&#8217;s modus operandi is far more nebulous, at least at first glance. 
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
So, the downside of Trump Mexico trip is that it gives Pena Nieto a platform to denounce Trump and the wall. And&#8230;wait, what&#8217;s the upside?
&#8212; James Oliphant (@jamesoliphant) <a href="https://twitter.com/jamesoliphant/status/770817472572362752">August 31, 2016</a></blockquote>
At the moment, Trump favorability ratings in Mexico are abysmal. He may very well be the most hated man in Mexico. But guess who&#8217;s the second most hated man in Mexico? Yup, the guy sitting behind the president&#8217;s desk in Mexico City. 
Citing polling data from the Mexican paper Reforma, the <a href="https://apnews.com/13e1b469bc7848b6b1c1a1b0e726a087/Poll:-Approval-rating-for-Mexican-president-falls-to-23-pct">Associated Press</a> reports that Peña Nieto&#8217;s approval rating has fallen over the last few years to an incredible new low of 23%. Roughly 74% of Mexican disapprove of his job performance. &#8220;The level is the lowest since just after Pena Nieto took office in December 2012, when he got a 50-percent approval rating in the same poll,&#8221; notes AP.
In fact, it&#8217;s the lowest approval rating for a sitting Mexican president since the Reforma first began tracking the polls in 1995. That same year, the price of the peso plunged into free fall.
Peña Nieto&#8217;s electoral woes are mostly self-inflicted. For the last few months, Mexico&#8217;s president has been embroiled in a series of controversies and scandals, ranging from plagiarism to corruption. 
In mid-July, he casually apologized to his countrymen after being accused of using his platform and contacts in the government to purchase $7 million of luxury real estate. 
&#8220;I repeat my sincere and profound apology for the offense and indignation I have caused you,&#8221; he <a href="http://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2016/07/19/Mexican-President-Pea-Nieto-apologizes-for-7-million-corruption-scandal/8601468932469/">stated</a> at the time.
Add this to the massive proliferation of drugs cartels and extrajudicial killings carried out by assassins and officers affiliated with city governments and you have a recipe for an unpopular president.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
To this point, two headlines Peña Nieto faces THIS WEEK: 
&#8226; Fired federal police chief over human rights abuses 
&#8226; Plagiarized his law thesis
&#8212; Gabriel Debenedetti (@gdebenedetti) <a href="https://twitter.com/gdebenedetti/status/770818518635995137">August 31, 2016</a></blockquote>
Like Trump, Peña Nieto needs a game changer, or better yet, a distraction. What&#8217;s better than a spontaneous meeting with one of the most polarizing and heavily-publicized candidates American presidential history?

Menu