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Trump and Mexican President Speak by Phone Amid Dispute Over Wall Trump and Mexican President Speak by Phone Amid Dispute Over Wall
(about 5 hours later)
MEXICO CITY — Amid the diplomatic showdown over President Trump’s order to build a border wall — and who should pay for it — Mr. Trump and President Enrique Peña Nieto of Mexico spoke by phone on Friday, both leaders said. MEXICO CITY — Amid the diplomatic showdown over President Trump’s order to build a border wall — and who should pay for it — Mr. Trump and President Enrique Peña Nieto of Mexico spoke by telephone for an hour on Friday and agreed to proceed with negotiations on a range of bilateral issues, both leaders said.
The two spoke for about an hour, and both presidents made an effort to say that the call had been productive, suggesting that tensions had cooled, at least publicly. The presidents made an effort to say that the call had been productive, implying that tensions had cooled, but they stood their ground on their positions, with no suggestion that the conversation had resolved their disagreement over fundamental issues, most notably the payment for construction of a wall between the United States and Mexico.
But they stood their ground on their positions, with no suggestion that the call had resolved their disagreement over fundamental issues. “With respect to payment for the border wall, both presidents recognized their clear and very public differences in their stances on this very sensitive issue, and agreed to solve these differences as part of a comprehensive discussion of all aspects of the bilateral relationship,” according to a statement issued by Mr. Peña Nieto’s office.
“With respect to the payment for the border wall, both presidents recognized their clear and very public difference between their stances on this very sensitive issue,” the Mexican president’s office said in a statement. “The presidents also agreed for now to not speak publicly about this controversial issue.” The statement added: “The presidents also agreed for now not to speak publicly about this controversial issue.”
The standoff with Mexico’s president has been the first full-blown foreign policy clash with a foreign leader for the Trump administration. The White House issued an almost identical statement, calling it “a joint statement.” But it differed in one key respect: It did not include any mention of an agreement to refrain from speaking publicly about the wall or its financing.
After Mr. Trump ordered the border wall to be built, months of tensions between the two men came to a boil this week. On Thursday, Mr. Peña Nieto, who has long urged diplomacy in the face of Mr. Trump’s disparaging comments about Mexico, canceled a meeting with the new American leader. The standoff with Mexico’s president was the first full-blown foreign policy clash with a foreign leader of the Trump administration, and was the culmination of months of tension between the two men surrounding Mr. Trump’s pledge to build the wall and renegotiate the Nafta trade accord.
Mr. Trump quickly fired back, saying that Mexico saddles the United States with criminals, illegal immigrants and unfair trade. On Friday, he repeated the same themes. The rancor came to a head this week after Mr. Trump issued an executive order for construction of the border wall. On Thursday, Mr. Peña Nieto, who has long urged diplomacy in the face of Mr. Trump’s disparaging comments about Mexico, canceled a meeting with the new American leader that had been scheduled for next Tuesday.
“We had a very good call,” Mr. Trump said in a news conference in Washington. “The border is soft and weak, drugs are pouring in, and I’m not going to let that happen.” “We had a very good call,” Mr. Trump said Friday at a news conference in Washington. “The border is soft and weak, drugs are pouring in, and I’m not going to let that happen.”
“We’re going to be working on a fair relationship and a new relationship,” Mr. Trump said, adding, “We’re no longer going to be the country that doesn’t know what it is doing.” “I have great respect for Mexico,” he continued. “I love the Mexican people.” But he added that Mexico “has outnegotiated us and beat us to a pulp through our past leaders.”
Mr. Trump said: “I have great respect for the Mexico. I love the Mexican people.” “They’ve made us look foolish,” he added.
But “as you know,” he added, Mexico “has outnegotiated us and beat us to a pulp through our past leaders.” Neither side disclosed who had initiated the phone conversation.
“They’ve made us look foolish,” he said. Mr. Peña Nieto did not comment beyond the statement issued by his office. But a Mexican government official described the conversation as “cordial” and said it went “relatively well.”
During the campaign and now as president, Mr. Trump has taken aim at perhaps the most prized possession of Mexico: its image. The presidents did not set another date to meet, in part to allow the relationship to “cool off,” said the official, who asked not to be identified to discuss a sensitive diplomatic issue.
Throughout his presidency, Mr. Peña Nieto has tried to portray his country as a place of economic opportunity, a cultural capital and a nation rising on the world stage. But they agreed to allow their teams to push forward with negotiations on a range of bilateral issues, including trade, immigration and the cross-border trafficking of drugs and weapons, the official said.
Mr. Trump has sought to show the opposite, characterizing Mexico as a bastion of crime, illegal immigration and the overwhelming beneficiary of free trade between the two countries. They also agreed to leave discussion about the wall and its funding out of the negotiations, in effect quarantining it so that it did not contaminate conversations about other issues, the official said.
For months, though his ratings fell to the lowest of any Mexican president in recent history, Mr. Peña Nieto resisted the temptation to saber-rattle, arguing that the relationship with America was simply too important to fall prey to a war of words. Mr. Peña Nieto was widely applauded in Mexico for canceling the meeting — a rare moment of public approval for a wildly unpopular leader.
To the growing anger of many Mexicans, he avoided responding rashly to Mr. Trump. Calls for the building of a wall, promises to deport millions and threats to tear up the North American Free Trade Agreement had been met with measured, understated responses. He received additional backing on Friday from Carlos Slim, the Mexican billionaire, who held a rare news conference to criticize Mr. Trump and publicly throw his support behind the Mexican government as it entered what he called “arduous, difficult” negotiations with the United States, specifically referring to Nafta.
But once Mr. Trump took office and pushed to make good on his campaign pledge to build a wall, the domestic pressure on Mr. Peña Nieto became too great. “We have to support the president of Mexico to defend the national interest,” Mr. Slim told a packed news conference at his business headquarters in Mexico City.
Across the Mexican political and intellectual class, calls for him to cancel the meeting reached a fever pitch this week. Mr. Peña Nieto canceled a meeting with Mr. Trump scheduled for next week, earning him political points at home. Mr. Slim said, “There are those” who “apparently don’t have pluralism, diversity, liberty, human rights, globalization, productivity, the environment, competition, on their radar,” in a clear reference to Mr. Trump, with whom he dined in Palm Beach last month.
As for what comes next, the Mexican president’s office said on Friday that the two leaders had “agreed to solve these differences as part of an all-encompassing discussion of all aspects of the bilateral relationship.” The White House team, he continued, is “negotiating from a position of strength to see if we weaken.” Like a growing number of Mexican business leaders and policy makers, Mr. Slim said that Mexico should be prepared to allow the United States to withdraw from Nafta if the Americans’ demands were too high.
“Both presidents have instructed their teams to continue the dialogue to strengthen this important strategic and economic relationship in a constructive manner,” the statement from Mr. Peña Nieto’s office said. But he said that Mexican negotiators must try to convince the Americans that “it’s better to do more business with us.”
The relationship between Presidents Peña Nieto and Trump – not to mention Mr. Trump’s with the rest of Mexico — had been on a downward trajectory since Mr. Trump took aim at Mexican immigrants during a 2015 speech that kicked off his campaign, and proceeded to build his White House run on promises to build a border wall, deport millions of Mexicans and pull out of Nafta.
On Monday, in advance of the meeting between the presidents that had been scheduled for next Tuesday, Mr. Peña Nieto released a set of principles that he said would guide any negotiations between the two countries. “Mexico doesn’t believe in walls,” he said.
The next day, however, Mr. Trump issued a Twitter message reaffirming his vow to build the wall, to which the Mexican president, responding in a televised speech distributed on social media, once again criticized the project and reiterated his longstanding vow that Mexico would never pay for it.
But on Thursday morning, Mr. Trump seemed to escalate the matter further with a threat to cancel the meeting should Mexico not be willing to pay for the wall, immediately prompting Mr. Peña Nieto’s cancellation of the meeting, a gambit that was widely applauded here by a population that has been clamoring for him to take a forcible stand against Mr. Trump’s provocations.
Mr. Slim, in his rambling 90-minute news conference, extolled the national unity he witnessed this week as Mexicans overwhelmingly rejected Mr. Trump’s treatment of Mexico.
“This national unity is very important to allow the government to go with dignity and strength to negotiate,” he said.