Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump will meet with Mexico’s president on Wednesday in a short-notice visit ahead of an important speech on immigration policy.
Mexico’s President Enrique Peña Nieto invited both presidential candidates for meetings on bilateral relations between Mexico and the US. Trump, who has called for Mexico to fund a wall closing off the borders between the two countries, accepted the invite.
The trip was announced yesterday in a Tweet.
I have accepted the invitation of President Enrique Pena Nieto, of Mexico, and look very much forward to meeting him tomorrow.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 31, 2016
Trump will travel to Mexico for the private meeting.
Peña Nieto’s invite comes as a surprise to many, considering Trump’s well-known statements derogatory to Hispanics in the past. The GOP candidate has labeled Mexican immigrants “rapists” and accused them of bringing drugs and crime into America.
He has called for hard-line measures heavily limiting immigration, which he will discuss on Wednesday night in a speech in Arizona.
Apart from his controversial comments on Mexico and Hispanics, Trump has a history with the President Peña Nieto, who once compared him to Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini.
The Mexican president has also dismissed Trump’s plan for a border wall as preposterous.
Trump’s Arizona speech is expected to be a defining and dramatic moment as the unpredictable candidate pins down his exact stances on details of immigration policy and border security. Political spectators are eager to see how the Mexico visit will fit into the picture.
