President Enrique Pena Nieto on Wednesday replaced his close ally and finance minister, Luis Videgaray, after the two were heavily criticized for Republican U.S presidential candidate Donald Trump's controversial visit to Mexico last week.
A somber-looking Pena Nieto told a news conference that Videgaray, who officials said was the architect of Trump's visit, would make way for former Finance Minister Jose Antonio Meade.
Pena Nieto was widely pilloried for hosting Trump at short notice last Wednesday. The New York businessman has repeatedly vowed to build a border wall to keep out illegal immigrants - which he said Mexico would pay for.
Trump has further infuriated Mexicans by threatening to carry out mass deportations and rewrite trade treaties crucial to their economy, and by referring to some immigrants from the United States' southern neighbor as rapists or drug runners
With economic growth sluggish, the president's popularity at record lows and tensions palpable between the finance minister and other Cabinet members, rumors of Videgaray's impending departure had bubbled under the surface in Mexico for months.
"The proverbial last straw was the Trump visit," said Agustin Barrios Gomez, a politician from the opposition leftist Party of the Democratic Revolution, and a driving force behind a draft bill sent to Congress this week to empower the government to retaliate against Trump if he threatens Mexican interests.
"(It) was seen as such a fiasco that he no longer had the credibility necessary to do his immediate job," he added.
Senior diplomats said Videgaray, 48, had been instrumental in arranging the American's visit, in which the government had hoped to impress upon Trump the need to moderate his tone and reconsider his more divisive campaign proposals.
Trump, speaking on Friday at the conservative Value Voters summit in Washington, painted Clinton as a "massive failure" while she was America's top diplomat from 2009 to early 2013, blaming her for the current turmoil in the Middle East.
"The problem is, Hillary Clinton is trigger-happy. Her tenure has brought us only war, destruction and death. She’s just too quick to intervene, invade, or to push for regime change," he said at the summit.
Meanwhile in New York, Clinton met with national security and foreign policy experts who are supporting her campaign to discuss terrorism. She touted the bipartisan nature of the meeting and vowed to work across the aisle as president to tackle national security challenges.
"The nominee on the other side promises to do things that will make us less safe," Clinton told reporters at a news conference on Friday afternoon. "National security experts on both sides of the aisle are chilled by what they’re hearing from the Republican nominee."
Both candidates are hoping to capitalize on concerns about national security and paint their opponents as unqualified leading into the Nov. 8 presidential election.