Before any of us could catch our breath between Trump tweets, the Republican presidential nominee tweeted last Wednesday, on August 30th, that he had accepted an invitation from Mexico's President, Enrique Peña Nieto. This was a controversial meeting that generated a lot of attention. This was surprising because if you've listened to any of his public speeches where he addresses Mexico, the people from there, or any proposed policy regarding the alleged wall he is advocating, you know that it doesn't make a whole lot of sense for one of the main victims of Trump's generalizing, personal attacks and proposed economic threats to invite him to visit.
However, this proved to be a powerful play for President Nieto simply because he was the initiator in welcoming Trump, who for so long has been the aggressor with respect to foreign policy regarding Mexico; specifically immigration and the future wall that Trump wants to build.
One of Donald Trump's central tenets of his platform is both implicitly and explicitly xenophobic and charged. To say that Trump has created an insurmountable amount of tension for one of our largest, closest economic trading partners and neighbors, is one of the great understatements of 2016. For President Nieto to invite Trump to supposedly address and resolve these issues head on, speaks about the character, poise, and diplomacy of the leadership of President Nieto.
In classic Trump fashion, there emerged two sides to the end of the story. Jason Miller, Trump's senior communications advisor, stated that it was a "relationship builder". This perspective was an attempt to downplay the hostility that Trump has generated for several weeks via Twitter and other mediums. Trump has frequently labeled Mexican immigrants as 'rapists' and 'criminals', the main reasons he calls for greater border security, namely in the form of a physical wall.
This issue was what the world expected the discussion between Trump and President Nieto to largely be about. However, Miller went on to describe the discussion as being "not a negotiation". This was in contrast to much of what Trump has expressed in part of the border wall. Trump has claimed that Mexico will be paying for the wall that will serve to keep their citizens from entering America illegally, because Mexico is in debt to America. Aside from the fact that this is a ludicrous plan for repayment, and not how international debt is repaid, the Mexican government would never concede to such a deal. Simply they would be accepting to the position that Trump held about their own citizens which is utterly farcical.
President Nieto shed some light on the discussion and further highlighted how Trump influenced and bolstered negative perceptions of the Mexican people. This, combined with the unrelenting swings from the Clinton campaign, cut the bullshit from this political publicity stunt from Trump and his advisors to try and paint a more diplomatic, rational, Mexico-friendly picture of Trump.
