Mexico: US Backtracks on Border Wall Plans
Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, president of Mexico, stated on Friday that the U.S. government does not want to construct new sections of wall along its frontier with Mexico and expressed skepticism that the planned construction would be carried out.
“It’s pure publicity,” Lopez Obrador said at a routine morning press conference after the Biden administration announced it would build additional sections of the border wall, continuing a signature Trump policy.
On Thursday, a high-level delegation of United States officials convened with their Mexican counterparts, including Secretary of State Antonia Blinken.
“They don’t want to build more sections of the wall; that’s what they told us,” Lopez Obrador commented.
Thursday, U.S. President Joe Biden stated that the construction funds were appropriated by Congress and that he could not legally redirect the funds.
Biden, upon assuming office in 2021, vowed that “no more American taxpayer dollars would be diverted to the construction of a border wall.”
In meetings the day before, the Mexican delegation stated that Mexico “does not believe (additional border wall construction) is the solution to the migration problem,” as stated by the president of Mexico.
“We’ve always spoken about tending to the root causes,” Lopez Obrador stated.
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