(CNN) Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto has called off an official trip to Washington to meet with President Donald Trump after a tense phone call brought the two leaders to a policy-driven standstill.

Peña Nieto was tentatively planning the trip for March, a White House official said, but the official confirmed to CNN that the trip was put on hold following the phone call, which took place on February 20.

According to The Washington Post, which first reported the cancellation , officials from both countries told the paper that Peña Nieto "called off the plan after Trump would not agree to publicly affirm Mexico's position that it would not fund construction of a border wall."

A White House official told CNN that any meeting would be awkward and counterproductive given Trump's vow that Mexico would pay for the wall.

The official said the call was "less hostile" than the one that occurred between the two leaders a year ago, but "no more productive" than that call either.

Read More</s>WASHINGTON — The United States has leveled its "heaviest sanctions ever" against North Korea, targeting the regime's shipping and trading abilities, President Donald Trump said Friday at the tail end of an address to a conservative gathering.

According to early excerpts from the president's remarks to the Conservative Political Action Conference, Trump was expected to announce the new "largest ever" package of sanctions against the North timed just as the Winter Olympics come to a close in the South Korean city of Pyeongchang. The president, however, gave his administration's actions to curb North Korea's nuclear ambitions only a brief mention toward the end of his speech, which lasted well over an hour.

"Hopefully something positive can happen," Trump said. "But that was just announced and I want to let you know. We have imposed the heaviest sanctions ever imposed."

Asked Friday afternoon what he would do if the new sanctions don't work to curtail North Korea's aggression, Trump said a "phase two" could be the next step.

"Phase two may be a very rough thing, may be very unfortunate for the world," Trump told reporters at the White House.

In his prepared CPAC remarks, Trump noted that the sanctions targeting 56 total shipping companies, businesses and shipping vessels will "further cut off sources of revenue and fuel that the regime uses to fund its nuclear program and sustain its military."

One day earlier, Vice President Mike Pence used his platform at the conference to remind attendees that the United States "doesn't stand with murderous dictatorships, we stand up to murderous dictatorships." Pence's comments come after his trip to the Olympic opening ceremonies earlier this month, where he sat during the playing of the North Korean national anthem.

Despite the tough talk, however, the vice president's office later confirmed to NBC News that a pre-planned meeting in Pyeongchang between Pence and North Korean delegates (including North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's sister, Kim Yong Nam) was derailed because North Korea backed out hours before the meeting was set to take place.

Trump's remarks Friday, in which he careened between a scripted speech and off-the-cuff commentary, were reminiscent of the campaign rallies that propelled him into office and dominated cable news throughout the 2016 election. He reiterated promises to build a wall between the U.S. and Mexico, and gave a dramatic reading of a song called "The Snake" meant to teach a lesson on the need for greater border security.</s>Barbara Dwyer wanted to go all in with Donald Trump in the 2016 Republican presidential primary race but couldn’t shake her hesitation and instead cast her vote for Sen. Marco Rubio.

A year into the Trump presidency, the 36-year-old stay-at-home mother of five said she is “a million percent” happy that she got it wrong.

“I love Sen. Rubio, I respect what he does, but Donald Trump is bringing a lot of energy to the party, and he is getting things done, which has not happened in quite some time,” said Mrs. Dwyer, attending the Conservative Political Action Conference last week just outside the Beltway. “A lot of people are coming around because they are happy and they are seeing the direction and excited about where we are headed.”

Mrs. Dwyer’s sentiment is the latest evidence of how firmly Mr. Trump has grasped the reins of the American conservative movement, erasing doubts about his own bona fides even as he draws the political right toward his own beliefs.

“Remember when I first started running?” Mr. Trump said as he kicked off his speech to CPAC on Friday. “I started running, and people say, ‘Are you sure he’s a conservative?’ I think, now, we’ve proved that I’m a conservative, right?”

The numbers back him up.

A CPAC/Washington Times poll of more than 1,100 attendees found that 93 percent of conservatives approve of the job Mr. Trump has done over his first year in office — up from 86 percent last year.

The crowd also was more optimistic about the direction of the nation than they were a year ago, with 75 percent saying the nation is on the right track, compared with 44 percent last year.

Conservatives are increasingly pushing for congressional Republicans to take their cue from Mr. Trump, with 79 percent saying Republican majorities in the House and Senate should be doing more to support the president — up from the 67 percent in last year’s poll. Just 4 percent of the conservatives said Congress should try to stymie Mr. Trump’s agenda.

“The conservative movement has found a new leader,” said Jim McLaughlin, who ran the poll.

In prior years, CPAC provided conservatives with a chance to reminisce about former President Ronald Reagan, dog-pile on President Obama, and lament how liberals and moderate Republicans had undercut the nation’s moral and fiscal underpinnings and tarnished the nation’s place on the world stage.

The confab also served as a showcase for the party’s biggest stars and home of the highly anticipated presidential preference straw poll, which Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky won in 2013, 2014 and 2015.

Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas captured the honor in 2016, the same year that Mr. Trump abruptly pulled out of the event amid reports that activists planned to stage a walkout to show their support for Mr. Cruz and concerns about Mr. Trump.

But little more than a year into the Trump presidency, those concerns have evaporated, with conservatives cheering the first major overhaul of the federal tax code since Reagan, appointing Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court and beginning to move the U.S. Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

William Temple, a CPAC regular known for dressing up in Revolutionary War garb, was behind the plan to walk out on Mr. Trump two years ago.

“I was a big Cruz supporter, but Trump has done everything that I wanted Cruz to do and more, and he has accomplished it in a year,” Mr. Temple said.

He said the president has been so successful that it has forced him to rethink his views on leadership.

“Why would we ever elect career politicians to do anything? We should be getting private-sector people, ex-military, whatever, people who actually have sacrificed for the country,” he said.

Mr. Temple said he also is happy that his top pick for the job lost and “as a matter of fact, I think Ted Cruz is looking at it and realizing the same thing.”

Mr. Cruz said nearly as much, telling the CPAC crowd that Mr. Trump’s “record of delivery has been remarkable.”

As far as conservatives are concerned, the biggest stains on Mr. Trump’s record are his uncouth behavior and his decision to sign off on a bill last month that increased spending over two years by $300 billion.

“In terms of his character, he seems fundamentally flawed. I will support a primary candidate, whoever it is, if a primary candidate runs in 2020,” said 22-year-old Joey Pickens. “I just think he’s an immoral person, and I don’t want him representing our country with his attitude and his values.”

That was a decidedly rare opinion among the conservative grass-roots leaders who make up CPAC.

“I was a Ted Cruz supporter, and the concerns I had was [Mr. Trump] not keeping his promises on a lot of things,” said 34-year-old Robert Sinnott. “But he seems to be doing a fairly good job on that. I am happy he has repealed a lot of different regulations like he said he would. I am happy about the tax cuts, and I didn’t really like him tweeting at first, but it seems to rile up the left, so it is good in a way.”

Rick Zimmerman, who supported Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and then Mr. Cruz in 2016 before voting for Mr. Trump in the general election, said the biggest barriers to getting more of the Trump agenda passed have been wayward Republicans such as Sen. John McCain of Arizona.

“If he had a better Congress he’d do more,” said Mr. Zimmerman, 71.

Mr. Zimmerman said he also is happy that he failed to envision Mr. Trump governing in such a conservative fashion.

“I just didn’t think he was going to be that kind of conservative,” he said. “I was wrong.”</s>The PyeongChang 2018 Winter Olympics are coming to a close on Sunday, Feb. 25. Athletes will have to pack up and go home, some with medals around their neck ready to celebrate and others empty-handed ready to do some sulking with pizza before getting back to training. While everyone was preparing to say goodbye to South Korea, Ivanka Trump made her debut, and here are some photos of Ivanka Trump at the Olympics closing ceremony.

Trump has not been to the Winter Games at all, but she did head out for South Korea Thursday, Feb. 22 in order to lead the U.S. delegation at the closing ceremony of PyeongChang 2018, at the behest of her father, President Donald Trump. In a statement given to CNN, Trump expressed her excitement about being chosen to represent the U.S. at the closing ceremony. She said,

You can see pictures of her at the closing ceremony here, in which she appears to be wearing the official Ralph Lauren Team USA gear.

A administration official told CNN that Ivanka Trump was the president's choice because he wanted to show support for Team USA by sending high-level delegations to the Winter Games. The official told CNN,

According to CNN, Ivanka Trump flew into Seoul and had dinner with President Moon Jae-in of South Korea at his home on Friday, Feb. 23. Then, she got to catch a little of the Winter Olympics action on Saturday and Sunday before the whole shebang came to a close Sunday.

Also travelling with Trump is White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders. When asked if the U.S. delegation would make it a point to meet with North Korea while at the Olympics, an official said that there are no plans for that, per Reuters. Officials have made it clear that the first daughter is only there to cheer on Team USA and reaffirm America's alliance with South Korea. As an avid skier herself, it's a good place for her to be.

Vice President Mike Pence led the U.S. delegation at the PyeongChang opening ceremony on Feb. 9. According to Reuters, he was supposed to meet with Kim Jong-un's sister, Kim Yo-jung, and other North Korean official in South Korea, but they canceled on the vice president at the last minute.

Ivanka Trump, who aside from being the first daughter also serves as the senior adviser to the president, actually worked with the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the city of Los Angeles to bring the 2028 Summer Olympics to the California city, which is the first time the Olympics are being hosted in the U.S. since 1996. So I guess it is only fair that she gets to see some Olympic action.

If I were a Trump and a "winter sports enthusiast" as one official put it, then I would probably be at all of the games cheering on Team USA as they go for gold. Especially if my father, the President of the United States, couldn't make a game or even send out a single tweet in support of our athletes trying to win it for the home team. It seems like a pretty sweet trade-off.</s>U.S. President Donald Trump meets Mexico's President Enrique Pena Nieto during the their bilateral meeting at the G20 summit in Hamburg, Germany July 7, 2017. Reuters/Carlos Barria
• Mexico's president will reportedly no longer visit the White House after he argued with President Donald Trump over his long-promised border wall.
• Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto attempted to persuade Trump to publicly admit that Mexico won't pay for the border wall.
• Trump promised repeatedly during his 2016 presidential campaign that he would force Mexico to pay for it.

Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto reportedly backed out of plans to visit the White House after a heated argument with President Donald Trump this week over his long-promised wall along the US-Mexico border.

Trump "lost his temper" during a nearly hour-long phone call on February 20, one Mexican official told The Washington Post. Peña Nieto had tried to persuade Trump to publicly acknowledge that Mexico will refuse to pay for the border wall, as Trump repeatedly vowed during his presidential campaign.

US officials told The Post that Trump was frustrated and exasperated by the call, as Trump believed it was unfair to expect him to renege on one of his favorite campaign refrains.

A White House readout of the call made no mention of the border wall argument, instead saying that Trump and Peña Nieto exchanged condolences over recent tragedies in each leader's country — a mass shooting in Florida and a helicopter accident in Oaxaca.

Prototypes for U.S. President Donald Trump's border wall with Mexico are seen behind the current border fence in this picture taken from the Mexican side of the border in Tijuana, Mexico, January 27, 2018. Reuters/Jorge Duenes "President Trump underscored his commitment to expanding cooperation between the United States and Mexico on security, trade, and immigration," the readout added.

The call marks the second time in a little more than a year that Peña Nieto and Trump have cancelled a planned meeting after an angry stand-off on the border wall.

In a January 2017 phone call, Trump told Peña Nieto he didn't want to meet with him because he "cannot live" with Peña Nieto publicly saying that Mexico wouldn't pay for the wall.

Trump urged Peña Nieto to say, "We will work it out" if either man was asked about payments for the border wall, according to a transcript obtained by The Washington Post last August.

"The fact is we are both in a little bit of a political bind because I have to have Mexico pay for the wall — I have to," Trump said. "I have been talking about it for a two-year period, and the reason I say they are going to pay for the wall is because Mexico has made a fortune out of the stupidity of US trade representatives."

The leaders' latest spat comes as Mexico heads into a presidential election later this year, prompting Peña Nieto to take a tough stance on Trump's border wall and avoid appearing to acquiesce to his demands, which Mexicans overwhelmingly view as humiliating and offensive.</s>The president of Mexico halted upcoming plans to visit the White House after a reportedly tense phone conversation with President Donald Trump, according to the Washington Post.

U.S. and Mexican officials told the Post that President Enrique Peña Nieto called off his visit to Washington D.C. after Trump refused his request to publicly affirm Mexico’s ongoing stance that the country will not pay for a border wall between the two countries during a phone call on Tuesday.

President Peña Nieto has long maintained that Mexico will not pay for Trump’s plans to fortify the border with a wall, as the country finds the gesture offensive.

The officials who were familiar with the call spoke to the newspaper on condition of anonymity because the 50-minute call was confidential.

A White House official confirmed with CNN that Peña Nieto’s meeting with Trump was tentatively scheduled for March, but was placed on hold after their conversation.

A three-sentence White House readout of the phone call did not specifically mention Trump’s multibillion-dollar border wall, but it did note that the president “underscored his commitment to expanding cooperation between the United States and Mexico on security, trade, and immigration.”

According to the Washington Post, Peña Nieto and Trump spent a “considerable portion” of the phone call discussing the border wall.

A Mexican official told the paper that Trump “lost his temper” during Tuesday’s conversation. U.S. officials said Trump was frustrated and exasperated because he thought Peña Nieto was being unreasonable for expecting him to walk back plans for his controversial campaign promise, according to the Post.

Leaked transcripts of a Jan. 27, 2017, phone call between the two leaders reportedly show Trump insisting that his wall was “the least important thing” to talk about while adding that “politically [it] might be the most important.”

During the conversation, both leaders agreed that talking about the wall was unproductive, but when Peña Nieto said, “Mexico cannot pay for that wall,” Trump responded: “You cannot say that to the press.”

“The press is going to go with that, and I cannot live with that,” Trump told Peña Nieto, according to the transcripts. “You cannot say that to the press because I cannot negotiate under those circumstances.”

A White House official told CNN that Tuesday’s call was “less hostile” than last year’s conversation, but not any more productive.</s>Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto has reportedly scrapped his plans to visit the White House after a contentious call with President Trump Donald John TrumpAccuser says Trump should be afraid of the truth Woman behind pro-Trump Facebook page denies being influenced by Russians Shulkin says he has White House approval to root out 'subversion' at VA MORE discussing his proposed border wall.

U.S. and Mexican officials familiar with the call told The Washington Post that Peña Nieto and Trump reached an impasse while discussing the wall. Peña Nieto reportedly asked Trump to publicly affirm Mexico’s stance that it will not pay for the wall, but Trump refused to cave.

A Mexican official told the paper that Trump “lost his temper” during the 50-minute call. U.S. officials said that Trump was “exasperated” and “frustrated” because he thought Peña Nieto’s expectation was unreasonable, according to the Post.

Peña Nieto’s visit was not yet confirmed, but was expected to take place sometime in the coming weeks. The Mexican president is facing a presidential election in July.

The border wall, one of Trump’s most divisive campaign promises, has been a source of contention between the two nations. Peña Nieto canceled a planned meeting with Trump in January 2017 due to conflict with Trump over the North American Free Trade Agreement and the border wall.

Arturo Sarukhan, a former Mexican ambassador to the United States, told The Washington Post that Trump has “painted” the relationship between the two countries “into a corner” with his insistence that Mexico would pay for the wall.

“Even from the get-go, the idea of Mexico paying for the wall was never going to fly,” Sarukhan said. “[Trump’s] relationship with Mexico isn’t strategically driven. It’s not even business; it’s personal, driven by motivations and triggers, and that’s a huge problem. It could end up with the U.S. asking itself, ‘Who lost Mexico?’ ”

Trump said repeatedly during the campaign that Mexico would foot the bill for the border wall expansion. And during a phone call in August, Trump pleaded with Peña Nieto to not say publicly that his government would not pay for the wall, according to leaked transcripts.

“If you are going to say that Mexico is not going to pay for the wall, then I do not want to meet with you guys anymore because I cannot live with that,” Trump said at the time.

Trump’s proposed framework for immigration legislation includes $25 billion in funding for the wall.</s>President Trump has refused to back down on his promise to make Mexico pay for a wall along the United States-Mexico border, prompting a White House trip by Mexican President Peña Nieto to be canceled.

Trump and Nieto decided to call off the planned visit in Washington, DC, after a phone conversation about the proposed U.S.-Mexico border wall and how it would be paid for — in one way or another — by Mexico.

Tentative plans for Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto to make his first visit to the White House to meet with President Trump were scuttled this week after a testy call between the two leaders ended in an impasse over Trump’s promised border wall, according to U.S. and Mexican officials. Peña Nieto was eyeing an official trip to Washington this month or in early March, but both countries agreed to call off the plan after Trump would not agree to publicly affirm Mexico’s position that it would not fund construction of a border wall that the Mexican people widely consider offensive, said the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a confidential conversation.

Since 2015, Trump has promised Americans that a border wall — currently held up in the prototype stage — would be built along the southern border to stop illegal immigration and cartel-driven drug flow into the country.

Mexico, Trump has committed, will somehow end up paying for the border wall, whether that comes in the form of taxing remittances to have illegal aliens from Mexico actually pay for the wall or tariffs on imported goods from Mexico.

Trump’s refusal to back down to Mexico on the border wall has been ongoing during his time as president. Last year, he told Nieto that he would be walking away from a deal with the country unless it included Mexico paying for the wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.

“The fact is, we are both in a little bit of a political bind because I have to have Mexico pay for the wall,” Trump told Peña Nieto, according to a transcript of the call. “I have to. I have been talking about it for a two-year period.”

“If you are going to say that Mexico is not going to pay for the wall, then I do not want to meet with you guys anymore, because I cannot live with that,” Trump continued.

Trump’s wall along the southern border is only expected to cost about $18 billion, a fraction of what American taxpayers have been paying for illegal immigration.

For example, American taxpayers are forced to pay about $116 billion annually for the cost of the estimated 12 to 30 million illegal aliens living across the U.S., as Breitbart News reported. The cost of illegal immigration to American taxpayers has risen by $3 billion since 2013.</s>Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto this week again postponed meeting with President Donald Trump in Washington, D.C. over Trump’s public insistence that Mexico will pay for his proposed border wall, the Washington Post reported Saturday.

The Post, citing unnamed U.S. and Mexican officials, said Peña Nieto had intended to come to Washington, D.C. in February or March to meet Trump in America for the first time since the Trump’s inauguration. The paper noted the pair met during the G20 summit in Germany in July of last year (pictured above).

But, the sources said, the plans were called off after Trump “would not agree to publicly affirm Mexico’s position” on the border wall — namely, that Mexico isn’t paying for it — during a phone call with Peña Nieto.

An unnamed Mexican official said Trump “lost his temper” over the dispute, the Post reported. Unnamed U.S. officials said Trump was frustrated and exasperated by the exchange.

An unnamed Mexican official added that Peña Nieto’s team was worried Trump would answer a question about funding the border wall during a press conference.

The same stalemate occurred just over a year ago, when Peña Nieto announced he would not be going to Washington to meet Trump as planned. Trump tweeted at the time: “If Mexico is unwilling to pay for the badly needed wall, then it would be better to cancel the upcoming meeting.”

Soon after, the Washington Post published the transcript of a call between the two leaders in which Trump said that the issue of who was actually paying for a border wall “is the least important thing that we are talking about, but politically this might be the most important talk about.”</s>US president's Twitter tirade seen as 'a new humiliation'

Another Twitter tirade by United States President Donald Trump is placing further pressure on already strained bilateral relations between Mexico and the U.S.

Two political experts said this week that an upcoming meeting between President Enrique Peña Nieto and Trump became even riskier following the latter’s latest online comments about Mexico.

In a statement last week, the Mexican Foreign Affairs Secretariat said a meeting between the two leaders is being planned for an unspecified time in the next few weeks.

But now one analyst believes that Peña Nieto should call off his trip to Washington while another warned that the meeting could be a complete fiasco.

Trump took aim at Mexico on Twitter yesterday, writing that efforts by United States authorities to deport violent criminals were being undermined by weak immigration policies south of the U.S. border.

“MS-13 gang members are being removed by our Great ICE [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] and Border Patrol agents by the thousands, but these killers come back in from El Salvador, and through Mexico, like water,” the U.S. president wrote.

“El Salvador just takes our money, and Mexico must help MORE with this problem. We need The Wall!” he concluded.

The vice-president of the Mexican Council on Foreign Relations, Susana Chacón, told the newspaper Reforma that the comments merit canceling the bilateral meeting, adding that as soon as it was announced, she knew it was a mistake.

“Why pay [Trump] a visit just to be given another slap?” she questioned.

“They’re thinking politically, not strategically, commercially or in security terms and that could be completely counterproductive,” Chacón said.

She also expressed regret that Trump’s latest attack came just days before the start of the seventh round of North American Free Trade Agreement renegotiation talks scheduled to commence in Mexico City tomorrow.

The analyst added that the meeting could also be damaging to the presidential campaign of the ruling party’s candidate, José Antonio Meade.

An academic from the Center for Research and Teaching in Economics (CIDE) agreed that that there was little to gain and a lot to lose if the meeting goes ahead.

“I don’t see what Peña Nieto and his presidential candidate can gain . . . I see [the meeting] as very high risk because of this new humiliation on the eve of the supposed meeting . . .” Carlos Heredia said.

“I don’t know if they are thinking that Trump is going to behave himself and say something that helps them [but] the risk of it turning into a diplomatic and even political fiasco is extremely high, even though they want to capitalize electorally,” he added.

Heredia also asserted that the meeting’s outcome is basically a foregone conclusion.

“. . . Maintaining a sterilized setting is impossible. We already know what’s going to happen: statements from Trump that are humiliating for Mexico and the president,” Heredia stressed.

The CIDE academic also said that he wasn’t surprised about Trump’s latest disparaging remarks, telling Reforma that it was a tactic the president had used previously in the lead-up to important meetings and one that played well with his supporters at home.

Finally, Heredia pointed out that it was misguided to say that MS-13 members arrived in the United States via Mexico given that the gang originated in Los Angeles.

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Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto cancels a scheduled trip to the United States after a heated phone call with U.S. President Donald Trump, in which Trump refused to publicly back down from his pledge of having Mexico pay for the U.S.–Mexico border wall.