Dear Commons Community,

The rhetoric on building a border wall between the United States and Mexico has been ratcheting up this past week with President Trump insisting that Mexico will pay for it.  Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto has repeatedly said the country would not be paying the bill for the wall. Instead, he said that Mexico stands in “full solidarity” with the U.S. as Tropical Storm Harvey batters Texas ― and offered “all the help that can be provided” as “good neighbors should.”  As reported by The Huffington Post:

“As the Mexican government has always stated, our country will not pay, under any circumstances, for a wall or physical barrier built on U.S. territory along the Mexican border,” the ministry said. “This statement is not part of a Mexican negotiating strategy, but rather a principle of national sovereignty and dignity.”

While refuting Trump’s wall claim, the foreign ministry added in its statement that it had offered help to the U.S. government in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey.

“The Mexican government takes this opportunity to express its full solidarity with the people and government of the United States as a result of the damages caused by Hurricane Harvey in Texas, and expresses that it has offered to provide help and cooperation to the US government in order to deal with the impact of this natural disaster.”

On a scale of 1 to 10 with ten being the highest, I would say that President Nieto’s statement  rates a 10 for “class”. 

Tony