Let me share a few more thoughts on how this Trump-Peña Nieto situation is shaking out.
First, it’s a very good question why President Peña Nieto didn’t contradict Trump when he made this claim at their joint press appearance. The problem for Trump is that we know Trump is a pathological liar. That’s certainly my opinion. And I know others would put it different. And his supporters wouldn’t say that. But I think it’s pretty widely understood that Trump says whatever is convenient at the moment with pretty little regard to what most of us would refer to as ‘the truth.’ So even though Pena Nieto looks pretty silly in all this, Trump has zero credibility.
Just a moment ago on CNN, David Axelrod said that Peña Nieto and his staff are now making clear that they have witnesses about what happened in the meeting.
But of course they do. It’s the presidential residence, Los Pinos! As we discussed last night, this is on the Mexican President’s ground. He’s in total control. Of course, he has witnesses. It’s the equivalent of the White House. If he chose to, his staff could easily have recorded the conversation. I see no reason to assume he didn’t Again, he’s meeting with Trump in the presidential residence.
The other point is a bit broader.
As Trump has fudged on whether he’ll deport 11 million undocumented immigrants, he’s tried to anchor himself on the Wall. In other words, well, maybe we’ll deport everyone or only ‘the bad ones’ or something. But the real thing is the Wall. And Mexico will pay for it. If that gets jettisoned, he doesn’t have a lot of his campaign positions left to fall back on.
