U.S. President Donald Trump has raised eyebrows after he told reporters that he has reached a "secret pact" with Mexico on immigration and trade that will take effect when he "wants it to."
Trump’s comments left his aides scrambling to insist that there are no secret components of an immigration deal struck last week between the United States and Mexico.
"That’s the agreement that everybody says I don’t have," Trump said at the White House Tuesday, holding one page of what he described as a lengthy deal. "I’m not going to say one way or the other, but I will tell you, right here is the story."
Trump, speaking to the media before leaving for a trip to Iowa, didn’t provide details of the nature of the agreement. Last Friday, the U.S. President said he was dropping plans for tariffs on Mexico that he’d been threatening to impose for the previous week after the country promised new steps to stem an influx of illegal migration into the U.S.
Under the deal, Mexico will expand deployment of its national guard throughout the country, "giving priority to its southern border," according to a joint statement from the two countries. Asylum seekers who cross into the U.S. will be quickly returned to Mexico where they’ll wait for their claims to be resolved; the U.S. agreed to accelerate adjudication of those legal matters.
Trump has also said that Mexico will soon make "large" agricultural purchases from the U.S. as part of the deal on border security and illegal immigration. However, three Mexican officials said Saturday that they were not aware of any side accord in the works, and that agricultural trade hadn’t been discussed during three days of negotiations in Washington that culminated in the joint communique between the countries last Friday.
