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Phoenix /AFP
White House hopeful Donald Trump issued a stern anti-immigration warning after visiting Mexico, saying people who cross into the United States illegally would never obtain legal status.
It was one in a series of stark declarations that framed a sweeping plan to crack down on illegal immigration following his more measured tone earlier in the day, when the Republican nominee huddled with Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto.
“We will break the cycle of amnesty and illegal immigration,” Trump declared to a rowdy crowd in Phoenix.
Immigration is Trump’s signature issue as he battles Democrat Hillary Clinton ahead of the November 8 election, and he laid out a tough, 10-point plan to end illegal border crossings and abusive behavior by undocumented people in the country.
“Our message to the world will be this: you cannot obtain legal status or become a citizen of the United States by illegally entering our country,” he said. “Those days are over.”
The fiery speech confirmed Trump’s hard line on immigration shortly after he insisted to Pena Nieto that a giant wall would be built on the US-Mexico border if he is elected.
The billionaire candidate’s plan includes deporting immigrants with criminal records, cancelling President Barack Obama’s executive orders protecting millions of undocumented migrants, and blocking federal funding to so-called “sanctuary cities” that bar discrimination against the undocumented.
Clinton has expressed support for a pathway to citizenship for most of America’s undocumented.
Her campaign called Trump’s performance part of his “campaign of hate”. “In his darkest speech yet, Donald Trump doubled down on his anti-immigrant rhetoric and attempted to divide communities by pitting people against each other and demonizing immigrants,” it said in a statement.
Trump is said to have been mulling whether to soften his hardline policies, particularly his early call to deport some 11 million undocumented migrants living in the shadows.
He has vacillated between reaching out to minorities and returning to the anti-immigration rhetoric admired by his most ardent supporters, mainly white working-class males.
His tense international trip on Wednesday saw Trump navigating a political tightrope just 69 days before the election.
While he insisted—as he regularly does on the campaign trail — that Mexico will pay for the wall, he said that he and Pena Nieto did not discuss who would fund the construction.
But Pena Nieto contradicted Trump, tweeting that he told the Republican nominee in their meeting that Mexico would not pay for such a wall.