All The Ways Donald Trump Has Insulted Mexico Are Longer Than His Wall
President Donald Trump has broken ties — and years of presidential decorum — by signing the executive order calling for a border wall that Mexico will pay for.
This action is essentially ending the amicable relationship between Mexico and the United States.
Historically, US-Mexican relations have been contentious, but diplomatic, dating all the way back to the first World War.
However, in more recent years, there have been considerable efforts to not only remain diplomatic, but to become friends in the joint quest to solve the immigration and drug problems along the shared border.
The good:
Back in 2005, Mexican soldiers crossed the border to help the thousands displaced by Hurricane Katrina.
A gesture George Bush, then-president, said "reflects the spirit of friendship that defines the relationship between our two countries and defines our personal relationship."
Then in 2015, Barack Obama welcomed Mexico's current president, Enrique Peña Nieto, to the White House as a friend and ally to discuss Mexican and American security.
Obama said,
Our commitment is to be a friend and supporter of Mexico in its efforts to eliminate the scourge of violence and the drug cartels that are responsible for so much tragedy inside of Mexico. And we want to be a good partner in that process, recognizing that ultimately it will be up to Mexico and its law enforcement to carry out the decisions that need to be made.
The bad:
But today, it has become clear America has entered a new era of relations with our allies.
President Nieto announced on Twitter on January 26 that he has canceled his upcoming visit to the White House.
The tweet translates,
This morning we have informed the White House that I will not attend the meeting scheduled for next Tuesday with @POTUS
Though it is true that President Trump has been particularly callous in his handling of US-Mexico relations, the tensions go back a couple of years.
Just weeks after President Trump announced his intentions to run in the 2016 election, the candidate made a highly polarizing speech, most importantly, affirming Mexico is not a friend of the United States.
This is what he said early in the speech:
When do we beat Mexico? At the border, they're laughing at our stupidity. And now they are beating us economically. They are not our friend, believe me.
Later on in the speech, he made a statement that many believed would take him out of the presidential race altogether,
When Mexico sends its people, they're not sending their best [...] They're sending people that have lots of problems, and they're bringing those problems [to] us. They're bringing drugs. They're bringing crime, their rapists. And some I assume are good people.
To which the Mexican people responded by creating large piñatas in his image to fill with candies and smack with bats.
And though this is the most publicized instance of Trump's racism toward Mexico, it is not the first occurrence of him belittling the Latino community.
Former Miss Venezuela, Alicia Machado, was very vocal during the 2016 election after presidential candidate Hillary Clinton announced the ways President Trump mistreated her during her year as Miss Universe back in 1996.
During a televised debate in October, Clinton said,
One of the worst things he said was about a woman in a beauty contest. He loves beauty contests, supporting them and hanging around them. And he called this woman 'Miss Piggy.' Then he called her 'Miss Housekeeping,' because she was Latina.
It's hard to imagine that things could have become worse.
The ugly:
And still, the tensions between Trump and the Latino community rose higher — even with Mexico's persistence on maintaining a close working relationship with the United States.
This translates to:
I congratulate President @realDonaldTrump for taking office. We will work in order to strengthen our relationship with shared responsibility.
This message of unity was tweeted only one week ago.
Within the span of one week, President Trump has successfully ticked off not only the current president, but also former Mexican president Vincente Quesada.
He has been rather vocal throughout this whole election.
In the past couple days, President Trump has amended some of his previous statements, claiming Mexico will be paying the United States back, instead of just paying for the wall up front.
But after a video released from President Nieto, reaffirming the Mexican people that they will not be paying for the border wall, President Trump said he would rather just not talk to the president at all.
Trump has also considered a 20 percent tax on Mexican imports, which would no doubt affect the prices of these items, once again putting the cost on the American people.
Over the next couple of days, the American people will learn who will actually be paying for the border wall.
It has been estimated that it will cost $15-25 billion dollars.
Citations: The American Presidency Project, The White House, Watch live: Hillary Clinton, Alicia Machado campaign in Florida (AOL)
