Sky-high protest: Mexican flag planted on roof of Trump Tower

Diego Saul Reyna poses with a Mexican flag at Trump International Hotel and Tower. (Facebook / Diego Saul Reyna)

A B.C. construction worker went to sky-high measures in Vancouver this weekend to send a strong message to U.S. presidential hopeful Donald Trump about his “racial generalizations” against Mexicans.

Diego Saul Reyna climbed to the roof of the Trump International Hotel and Tower early Saturday morning to unfurl a Mexican flag.

The move comes in the wake of Trump’s disparaging comments about Mexican immigrants in the U.S.

The Port Moody, B.C., resident said although he doesn’t personally work on the downtown Vancouver tower, many Mexicans do, and the project is a success thanks in part to their hard work.

“His comments were very hurtful,” Reyna says of Trump’s remarks, adding that he wanted to show the politician how much he’s benefitting from Mexican labour in Canada.

“When you say all Mexicans are criminals – that includes my father, who is the person I admire most. He taught me to respect women and to work hard and be honest. And that includes my mother… my teachers, coworkers… everyone I ever loved and respected is given the same label.”

Reyna and a friend arrived at the construction site at 7 a.m. wearing their “regular work clothes” and walked up the stairs to the 65th floor after someone took them up the first 20 in an elevator.

After catching his breath, Reyna used string to hang the flag between two glass panels.

“We thought of using wire but we didn’t want to damage the glass. If I did it would validate his idea that we are criminals so very carefully we used string,” he said.

The flag has since been removed from the roof, but the statement has gone viral. A Facebook post outlining the incident was shared close to 6,000 times in 48 hours.

Reyna feels no one stopped them because they appeared confident and “knew what they were doing.”

“I think deep down inside me I knew what I was doing was right so I didn’t look guilty,” he said.

“Any group of people that gets labelled so negatively and generally, whether it be the whites, the Swedish, the Danish, the Asians, anyone – I’m willing to stand up for. In this case it’s my own racial group.”