Trump dines with Mexican billionaire critic Carlos Slim
21 Dec 2016 11:30 PM GMT
President-elect Donald Trump dined with Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim, who harshly criticized the US developer’s presidential campaign before his win, transition officials said.
Trump invited Slim to his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, and then called it “a lovely dinner with a wonderful man,” according to a statement published by The Washington Post.
A source close to Trump, a billionaire developer turned television star turned politician, confirmed the event.
It also was confirmed in Mexico by a spokesman for Grupo Carso, owned by Slim, a telecoms magnate who before the election slammed Trump for his populist rhetoric.
Trump angered Mexicans by vowing to make their government pay for a giant border wall and pledging to deport millions of migrants, whom he called rapists and drug runners.
Slim quipped last month that Trump would destroy the US economy if he won the election.
“As we say in Mexico, being a drunk is different from being a bartender,” Slim told reporters then.
Slim said at the time that a Trump administration could impose a 35 per cent import tariff that would dramatically raise prices in the United States.
But on Monday, a Slim spokesman said the dinner meeting was “cordial... with a good attitude toward Mexico and Mexicans.”
Trump lashed out at Slim after The New York Times published claims from women accusing the real estate baron of sexual misconduct. Slim is the newspaper’s largest shareholder.
.... wins Electoral College vote, now formally set to be 45th US President
Donald Trump on Tuesday won the Electoral College vote to formally secure his election as the US’ 45th president, easily staving off a long-shot bid by opponents to turn Republican electors against him amid claims that Russian hackers swayed the vote in his favour.
The Electoral College affirmed Trump as the president about six weeks after his stunning victory over Hillary Clinton, pushing him past the 270-vote threshold for election, with scant evidence of the anti-Trump revolt among electors that some of his critics had hoped would occur. Trump received 304 electoral votes to Hillary Clinton’s 227.
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