Former Mexican President Vicente Fox said Donald Trump reminds him of Adolf Hitler, escalating the insults he’s leveled at the Republican frontrunner this week.
“Today, he’s going to take that nation (U.S.) back to the old days of conflict, war and everything. I mean, he reminds me of Hitler. That’s the way he started speaking,” Fox said in a phone interview with CNN on Friday.
In an interview with Fusion earlier this week, Fox said Mexico would not pay for the wall that Trump has vowed to build along the U.S. border with Mexico. Trump has said he will make Mexico pay for the wall.
“I declare, I’m not going to pay for that f–king wall,” Fox said in the interview. “He should pay for it. He’s got the money.”
Fox doubled down on that comment in Friday’s interview and refused to apologize.
“He has offended Mexico, Mexicans, (and) immigrants. He has offended the Pope,” Fox said. “He has offended the Chinese. He’s offended everybody.”
Trump has been compared to the Nazi leader by others, including former New Jersey Gov. Christine Todd Whitman and the stepsister of Anne Frank, the young girl whose diary made her a symbol of the innocent people killed during the Holocaust.
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Write to Katie Reilly at Katie.Reilly@time.com