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Joan McCarter covered some of the absolutely bonkers quotes from the newly released transcripts of Donald Trump’s rants—er, phone conversations—with various world leaders following his inauguration, but his call with Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto about his precious border wall has to take the cake.
Sure, Trump spent the entirety of his presidential campaign boasting that the monstrosity would not only be “big and beautiful,” but that Mexico would gladly foot the estimated $70 billion dollar bill. Mexican leaders, however, have consistently said “absolutely fucking not.”
So after taking office and being forced with the reality that, “Oh shit, I’m actually president now and this means I have to make good on that whole Mexico paying thing,” Trump used the call to tell Peña Nieto that if they can’t at least agree to some empty word salad to convince Trump supporters that a wall would eventually happen thanks to Mexico, to at least pretty please stop talking about the fucking thing:
One big takeaway is that Trump seems to acknowledge exactly what his pledge to make Mexico pay for the border wall was — a hollow promise meant to rile up the base.
At one point in his call with Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto, Trump even acknowledges that the wall is “the least important thing we are talking about, but politically this might be the most important.”
You hear that, Trump supporters? That applause line that Trump used with such gusto for basically his entire campaign — “Build that wall,” and “Who's going to pay for it? (Crowd response: MEXICO!)"? It was all vote-bait, red meat for voters who didn't know that it was completely impractical and would never happen.
And within his first days in office — this call took place on Jan. 27, a week after Trump's inauguration — Trump was already throwing in the towel on it on a call with the Mexican president.
“We should both say, ‘We will work it out.’ It will work out in the formula somehow,” Trump told Peña Nieto during the conversation. “As opposed to you saying, ‘We will not pay,’ and me saying, ‘We will not pay.’ But you cannot say that to the press. The press is going to go with that, and I cannot live with that.” Translation: I’m fine with swindling my supporters, what I care about is how it makes me look in the press. Sad!
”Hearing Trump basically acknowledge that fact and concede he pulled the wool over his supporters' eyes, just seven days into his presidency, is pretty remarkable,” notes the Washington Post. Hey, they were warned what they were voting for—a swindler, and a lousy one at that.