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News > Latin America

Mexico Slams White Supremacist Protest Near New York Consulate

  • U.S. President Donald Trump has asked for US$25 billion in order to build a wall on the Mexico-U.S. border.

    U.S. President Donald Trump has asked for US$25 billion in order to build a wall on the Mexico-U.S. border. | Photo: Reuters

Published 31 July 2018
Opinion

Relations between the two countries have been tense since Trump said during his campaign that Mexico was sending criminals and rapists to the United States.

Mexico's Foreign Ministry has condemned protesters that it said shouted racist comments and distributed anti-migrant leaflets outside its New York consulate last week.

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200 Migrants Killed on US-Mexico Border in 2018, Trump Threatens Shutdown

"On Saturday a group of racist, ignorant and xenophobic people were at our consulate in NY," Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray wrote on Twitter on Tuesday. "We reject and condemn these events."

Members of a group calling itself Identity Evropa, some dressed as construction workers, demonstrated on Saturday outside the consulate, holding large letters that spelled 'Build the Wall.' Identity Evropa has said it is dedicated to defending people of European heritage.

Mexico's government said it had written a diplomatic note to the U.S. State Department about the incident, which it said worsened the climate for the country's relationship with the United States.

Identity Evropa said in a statement on Tuesday that the Mexican government tacitly supported illegal immigration to the United States and that the group was a movement for European Americans against mass immigration and globalization.

Photos and video on the group's Twitter page showed around 45 people at the protest, shouting 'Make America Great Again,' a campaign slogan of U.S. President Donald Trump.

Trump said on Sunday he would allow the federal government to shut down if Democrats do not fund his border wall and back immigration law changes, betting that maintaining a hard line will work in Republicans' favor in November congressional elections.

The Republican president has threatened a shutdown several times since taking office in 2017.

Congress must agree on a spending measure to fund the government by a Sept. 30 deadline.

Although Republicans control both the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, disagreements between moderates and conservatives in the party have impeded a speedy legislative fix.

Standoffs over spending levels and immigration led to a three-day government shutdown, mostly over a weekend, in January and an hours-long shutdown in February.

The House in June rejected an immigration bill favored by conservative Republicans.

The Republican president has made tougher immigration laws a centerpiece of his administration, from the first ill-fated travel ban on people from predominantly Muslim nations to the current battle raging over the separation of illegal immigrant children from their parents at the U.S.-Mexicoborder.

A federal judge on Friday urged the U.S. government to focus on finding deported immigrant parents whose children remain in the United States.

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