This article is more than 3 years old

This article is more than 3 years old

Donald Trump issued a staunch defence of his expanded deportation policy on Thursday, claiming his administration was getting “bad dudes out of this country”, further souring an already tense visit to Mexico by his secretaries of state and homeland security.



The president made his remarks at a business forum in Washington while Rex Tillerson, his secretary of state, was meeting his Mexican counterpart, Luis Videgaray.

Tillerson emerged to concede that there were differences between the two countries. He said it was natural for “two strong, sovereign countries” to disagree at times, but added they would continue their dialogue.

“In a relationship filled with vibrant colors, two strong sovereign countries will have their differences,” Tillerson said, summarising the talks, which he said covered “the full range of bilateral issues”, including defending the border against “terrorism” and “drug cartels”.

Mexico will not accept Trump's immigration plans, says foreign minister Read more

The visit by Tillerson and the head of homeland security, John Kelly, was intended to be a bridge-building exercise, to soothe fears aroused by Trump’s racist rhetoric both on the campaign trail and during his continued demands that Mexico pay for a wall on the US border.

Senior US officials had said the talks in Mexico City would highlight mutual interests in fields such as counter-narcotics and counter-terrorism and securing Mexico’s southern border.

But new US immigration proposals unveiled on the eve of the trip, aimed at more deportations of Mexican and other Latin American undocumented immigrants, drew an angry response from the Mexican government and threatened to derail talks. After Trump’s remarks on Thursday, a minister cast doubt on whether a planned meeting between Tillerson, Kelly and the Mexican president, Enrique Peña Nieto, would even take place.

The foreign minister, who is a close aide to Peña Nieto, declared that Mexico would defend its people living in the United States and go to the United Nations if necessary. He also rejected any suggestions that non-Mexican deportees would be deported to Mexico, dismissing the US proposals as “unilateral”.

“It will be a long road to building an agreement with the United States,” Videgaray said, “but we have taken a step.”

Trump used his remarks to US business leaders to combine a vigorous defence of deportations with a fresh attack on the 1994 Nafta free trade agreement, which is strongly supported by the Peña Nieto government.



“We’re going to have a good relationship with Mexico,” the president said, before adding: “And if we don’t, we don’t.”

Noting that Tillerson was in Mexico City, Trump said: “That’s going to be a tough trip. Because we have to be treated fairly by Mexico … But he’s over there with General Kelly, who’s been unbelievable at the border.

“What’s happening at the border: for the first time we are getting gang lords out, drug lords out. These bad dudes out of this country and at a rate that nobody’s ever seen before and they’re the bad ones,” the president said. “It’s a military operation … Much of that is because people are here illegally. And they’re rough and they’re tough but they’re not tough like our people. So we had to get them out.

“We are getting bad dudes out of this country at a rate we’ve never seen before,” the president said.

But in Mexico City, Kelly appeared to contradict Trump, insisting there would be “no mass deportations” and “no use of military force in immigration”.

Mexico’s economy minister, Idelfonso Guajardo, said the planned meeting between the two US cabinet secretaries and Peña Nieto at the Los Pinos presidential residence would be dependent on the outcome of the ministerial talks.

“The meeting at [Los] Pinos will happen, if it happens, in the context of the agreements they reach,” and if there were clear messages to be sent through the envoys, Guajardo told Foro TV.

The remarks by Videgaray and Guajardo seemed to indicate a tougher stance by the Mexican government in response to the Trump administration.

“The language has changed,” said Esteban Illades, editor of the Mexican magazine Nexos. “It took them long enough, but they’re finally saying ‘no’.”

This is not the first time placatory messages carried by members of Trump’s cabinet have been undermined by contradictory signals emanating from the White House.

Before Vice-President Mike Pence went to Brussels last week to pledge a “steadfast and enduring” US commitment to the European Union, Trump’s chief strategist, Steve Bannon, met the German ambassador to Washington, according to the Reuters news agency, and described the EU as a flawed construct, making clear that the new administration preferred to conduct bilateral relations with individual European countries.

A German official confirmed that the meeting between Bannon and the ambassador, Peter Wittig, had taken place but refused to characterise the conversation. The official, however, pointed out that it was against the EU charter for EU member states to carry out bilateral trade negotiations with non-EU countries.