President Pena Nieto Calls for National Unity in Face of 'America-First' Strategy Clodomiro Puentes - WSWS.org
go to original February 14, 2017

Over the weekend, tens of thousands of Mexicans demonstrated against US President Donald Trump and thier own President Enrique Peña Nieto (Al Jazeera English)

Last week, Enrique Peña Nieto issued a call for “national unity” during a brief televised address. It was clearly a bid to redirect social anger from the crisis-ridden PRI (Institutional Revolutionary Party) government and deflect it onto to the Trump administration, which is reviled in Mexico in roughly equal measure.

Referring obliquely to the telephone exchange in which Trump thuggishly threatened to send troops into Mexico, Peña Nieto recounted that, “Although we haven’t reached agreement on any issue, this conversation opened a space for the Mexican government and the US government to continue a dialogue.”

He said these “issues” included “national sovereignty,” “respect of our dignity and independence” and “cooperation between two countries that are neighbors, friends and allies in trade,” all of which euphemistically point to the Trump administration’s intention to renegotiate harsher terms for Mexico’s subordination to US imperialism.

Unmentioned in the address was the PRI’s inability and unwillingness to do anything other than accede on every point of substance relating to Trump’s proposed border wall, plans to carry out the deportation of millions of undocumented immigrants, the potential scrapping of NAFTA and a more bellicose footing throughout the Americas on the pretext of “national security,” all of which are of a piece with Washington’s “America-first” strategy.

The Mexican president promised to provide over one billion pesos in additional funding to the country’s consulates in the United States in an effort to appear invested in the defense of immigrants of Mexican origin against predatory US immigration policies.

The Mexican Secretariat of Foreign Affairs (SRE) issued a statement last Friday urging Mexican nationals living in the US to “take precautions and stay in contact with their nearest consulate to obtain the necessary help,” citing the recent deportation of Guadalupe García de Rayos, a Mexican-born mother of two in Arizona, whose deportation was “not deemed a priority” for ICE officials under the Obama administration.

Read the rest at WSWS.org

Related: Jesús Silva-Herzog Márquez: Mexico Is Stronger Without False Unity (Mexico Voices)

Related: In Mexico, Trump Inspires Movement for Political Change (Deutsche Welle)

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