A Trump-Nieto Summit?

Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto said Tuesday he is willing to meet with Donald Trump in what would surely be huge moment for GOP nominee’s campaign.

“Yes, I would meet with him,” Peña Nieto said in a pre-taped television interview broadcast Tuesday night.

“I can’t agree with some of the things he has said, but I will be absolutely respectful and will seek to work with whomever becomes the next president of the United States.”

“I have never met him. I can’t agree with some of the things he has said, but I will be absolutely respectful and will seek to work with whomever becomes the next president of the United States.”

Peña Nieto’s change of tone — he only a few months ago likened Trump to Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini — may come with his acceptance of a Trump presidency as a real possibility, and provides the Trump campaign an opportunity for a possible public relations coup.

“A meeting between Peña Nieto and Trump could be beneficial politically for both, probably more so for Trump, who should grab the opportunity to show he can meet with a foreign leader and discuss serious differences rationally,” Kevin Kearns, president of the U.S. Business and Industry Council, told LifeZette.

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Foreign policy is sometimes said to be Trump’s biggest weakness. A successful meeting with a foreign leader — one who at one point seemed virulently opposed to Trump’s candidacy — could go a long way to silence some of the scaremongering about Trump’s recklessness.

But the meeting would not be an automatic slam-dunk.

“The meeting is a huge opportunity for Trump,” Eddie Zipperer, assistant professor for political science at Georgia Military College, said to LifeZette, “But it’s not without its dangers for him either. Whether it helps or hurts Trump will be dependent on what Nieto tells the press afterward. If he comes out of the meeting with a negative report on Trump, it will hurt a small amount. If he gives the standard, it was a productive meeting, blah, blah, blah. It won’t matter. But if he comes out of it with positive things to say about Trump, it will be huge.”

“So Trump has to show up ready to make one of his trademark deals and leave a good impression on Nieto,” Zipperer continued, “Trump says he gets along with everybody, this is his chance to prove it.”

The U.S.-Mexico relationship is clearly an important one — Mexico is the U.S.’ third-largest trading partner and the U.S. is Mexico’s largest trading partner. A strengthened U.S.-Mexico relationship could also counter the growing economic influence of China in our hemisphere. China is currently the U.S.’ number one trading partner, a partnership which benefits the Chinese more than it does the American people.

Stressing his understanding of the importance of this relationship and demonstrating an openness toward strengthening it would also go far to undermine Trump’s negative image as anti-Hispanic.

Meeting with Peña Nieto would also give Trump the ability to highlight the importance of a properly controlled border for both countries in terms of national security. It’s easy to see how an unsecure border is a threat to the livelihoods — and often lives — of U.S. citizens, but the fact is that an open border with Mexico causes just as much, if not more, devastation.

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Mexico has a major drug cartel problem, a problem Peña Nieto has been criticized for failing to address adequately.

In January 2015, “Mr Obama also gave Mr Peña [Nieto] some badly needed moral support over the presumed murder of 43 students in southwestern Guerrero in September by police and municipal authorities, allegedly on the payroll of organised crime,” The Economist reported. “Instead of lecturing the Mexican president on human rights abuses by security forces, as some urged Mr. Obama to do, he said the United States wants to be a ‘good partner’ on security issues.”

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But as long as the U.S.-Mexico border is effectively open, the drug cartels will continue to thrive and continue to bring terror to innocent, law-abiding Mexicans. Obama’s promise of being a “good partner” with Mexico on security is belied entirely by the immigration and border policies that Obama and the Democrats pursue.

A meeting with Peña Nieto would provide Trump the opportunity to stress that closing the border isn’t just a crucial for American jobs and safety, but imperative if Mexico wishes to prevent its continued slide into a de facto warzone.

Of course, if Trump were to actually meet with Peña Nieto, such a meeting would likely be surrounded by protesters — but such a protest might be another boon for Trump. The mainstream media would indeed be hard-pressed to explain radical demonstrators protesting Trump as an anti-Latino racist as he sits down to a cordial meeting with the Mexican president.