WASHINGTON — Donald Trump has accepted an invitation to meet with President Enrique Peña Nieto of Mexico on Wednesday, he said via Twitter late Tuesday. The meeting will come hours before Trump delivers a high-stakes speech in Arizona to clarify his views on immigration policy, according to people familiar with the discussions.
Last Friday, Peña Nieto invited the Republican presidential nominee and Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton to visit Mexico, his office said in a statement. The statement said that both campaigns received the invitations ‘‘on good terms.’’
Trump, sensing an opportunity, decided over the weekend to accept the invitation and push for a visit this week, according to the people familiar with the discussions who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity surrounding the matter.
They said late Tuesday that talks between the Trump campaign and Mexican officials were ongoing, with logistics and security concerns still being sorted out.
Trump is scheduled to hold fund-raisers Wednesday morning in California and deliver his immigration speech in the evening at the Phoenix Convention Center. His trip to Mexico will occur between his events.
The visit will come after Trump has wavered for weeks on whether he would continue to hold his hard-line positions on the central and incendiary issue of his campaign, in particular his call to deport an estimated 11 million immigrants who are living in the United States illegally.
In addition to vows of mass deportations, Trump has repeatedly promised to build a wall along the US-Mexico border and force Mexico to pay for it. Peña Nieto and other Mexican leaders have dismissed the idea as preposterous.
‘‘There is no way that Mexico can pay [for] a wall like that,’’ Peña Nieto said in a July interview on CNN, adding that he did not agree with Trump’s frequent characterization of illegal Mexican immigrants as rapists and killers.
The campaign has spent days dismissing questions about whether Trump’s positions on immigration are shifting, instead emphasizing his commitment to securing the border with Mexico. But the scale and scope of potential deportations remain subjects of intense interest — and Trump is caught between appeasing his staunchest supporters and attempting to appeal to moderate Republicans and independent voters with a softer stance.
Questions about what would become of the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants if Trump is elected have gone largely unanswered by the candidate and his team in recent days. The campaign has suggested that Wednesday’s speech will address those questions and concerns.
‘‘I expect the speech to be a refinement of the goals he’s always stated,’’ said Representative Kevin Cramer, a North Dakota Republican and a Trump supporter. Cramer said that he would like to see Trump lay out a ‘‘chronology’’ of actions that he would try to achieve.
At a campaign stop in Dalton, Ga., on Tuesday, running mate Mike Pence billed Trump’s speech as a chance for the nominee to get highly specific about his plans. Responding to a question about illegal immigration, Pence advised, ‘‘Wait about 24 hours, you’re going to hear a lot of details.’’
‘‘Don’t miss it. OK? It’s going to be a very important address,’’ he added later.
