Mexican President: Trump Won’t Build a Wall

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Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said in an interview on Monday that former President Donald Trump would not follow through on his 2016 campaign pledge to build a wall on the U.S. border with Mexico if reelected.

“Because we understood each other very well. We signed an economic, a commercial agreement that has been favorable for both peoples, for both nations. He knows it. And President Biden, the same,” López Obrador said in an interview with CBS News’ “60 Minutes” released on Sunday.

He added that a wall “doesn’t work,” and said he told Trump that during a phone call when Trump was president.

“That was the only time, and I told him: ‘I am going to send you, Mr. President, some videos of tunnels from Tijuana up to San Diego, that passed right under U.S. Customs.’ He stayed quiet, and then he started laughing and told me, ‘I can’t win with you,’ ” López Obrador said during the interview.

He went on to say that relations between the United States and Mexico are “very good” and noted that they “are not distant neighbors,” but he also rejected House Speaker Mike Johnson’s suggestion that the U.S. could force Mexico to follow American immigration policy.

“We are not a colony. We are not a protectorate of any foreign country. And we have a very good relationship with the government of the United States — but not one of subordination,” he said.

López Obrador also noted, “Every time I speak with President Biden, the first thing he says to me is that our relationship must be on an equal footing.”