White House: Trump calling Mexican president over earthquake

The White House announced Tuesday that President Trump had plans to call Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto to express condolences over the earthquake that shook southern Mexico last week.

White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders was asked by a reporter why Trump hadn’t called Peña Nieto after an 8.2 magnitude earthquake rocked the country Friday, leaving about 100 dead.

“They actually have a call scheduled today, it’s actually taking place, I think, within the hour,” Sanders replied.

Mexico on Monday rescinded a previous offer to extend aid to U.S. victims of Hurricane Harvey, citing improved conditions around Houston and a need to send emergency supplies to the southern states of Oaxaca and Chiapas, the hardest hit by the earthquake.

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Shortly after the flooding in Texas, Mexico offered disaster assistance, which Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) accepted, but Trump never officially responded to the offer.

Trump has had tense relations with Mexico, which has resisted his efforts to renegotiate NAFTA and build a southern border wall.

Along with Abbott, several U.S. mayors and governors were quick to express their regrets over the earthquake and Hurricane Katia, which hit the Mexican Gulf Coast over the weekend. 

But aside from Sanders’s comments at the White House briefing Tuesday, the White House has remained silent about the natural disasters in Mexico.

The Mexican military had sent units to Texas and Mississippi to help victims of Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

In its statement Monday, the Mexican foreign relations secretary thanked Abbott, who shortly after the earthquake offered his assistance in disaster relief efforts.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson called Foreign Relations Secretary Luis Videgaray on Monday to offer condolences over the earthquake, according to The Los Angeles Times.

“Tillerson offered his condolences for the loss of life and the devastation caused by the earthquake in Mexico and from Hurricane Katia,” said State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said.