[President Andrés Manuel López Obrador is wildly popular among
Mexicans at home and abroad. It’s not just because of his domestic
policies: AMLO is also playing a key role in challenging US dominance
in Latin America.]
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AMLO IS TRYING TO FREE MEXICO AND LATIN AMERICA FROM THE US’S
IMPERIAL GRIP  
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Medea Benjamin
July 21, 2022
Jacobin
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_ President Andrés Manuel López Obrador is wildly popular among
Mexicans at home and abroad. It’s not just because of his domestic
policies: AMLO is also playing a key role in challenging US dominance
in Latin America. _

Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador delivers brief
remarks while talking to journalists with US president Joe Biden in
the Oval Office at the White House on July 12, 2022, in Washington,
DC., Chris Kelponis — Pool / Getty Images

 

When Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador traveled to
Washington, DC, on July 12, his most exciting encounter for Mexicans
in both the United States and Mexico was not his meeting with
President Joe Biden but his impromptu encounter with well-wishers
outside his hotel room at the Lombardy. Some of them had driven from
places like Chicago and New York City just to get a glimpse of their
president.

The video of the encounter, which must have been a nightmare for the
Secret Service protecting him, went viral. It showed the president
(known by his initials AMLO) sticking his head out the window, blowing
kisses, catching a bouquet of flowers thrown to him, and being
serenaded by mariachis singing the song “Amigo” (“You are my my
soul brother, a friend that in every way and day is always with
me”).

AMLO showered them with praise, thanking them for their sacrifice of
coming to the United States and working hard in order to send money
back to their families in Mexico. “You are heroes and heroines,”
he said, with a huge grin. “Our economy is rising because of what
you send to your relatives. You are exceptional migrants. I love you
very much.” He shared with them his plans to meet with President
Biden and push for immigration reforms so that they could come and go
legally. The adoring crowd below shouted back, “We love you,
president, we are with you.”

According to a poll
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in early July, the dozens who gathered below the hotel window
represent millions of Mexicans. It showed AMLO with a 66 percent
approval rating, one of the highest of all world leaders. This despite
the myriad problems that continue to plague the nation: inflation,
corruption, violence.

AMLO has plenty of detractors. Critics from the Right condemn his
populist economic policies, such as the nationalization of lithium.
They say he has centralized power and does not tolerate dissent. On
the Left, critics say he is complicit with repressive US immigration
policies, has reneged
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his promises to defend indigenous rights, and hasn’t done enough to
stop the horrific wave of femicides
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attacks on journalists.

But his fans see him as a man of the people who rode to power on
December 1, 2018, with an overwhelming mandate to break with the
corrupt parties that had ruled Mexico for almost a century. One of his
first acts was to cut his own salary by half and slash the wages of
most other top officials. He put the extravagant presidential plane up
for sale, preferring to travel in economy class on commercial flights.
He opened up the former presidential residence to the public, allowing
millions of Mexicans and tourists to enjoy the palatial home and
gardens.

Another reason for the president’s popularity is the extraordinary
effort he puts into communicating with the public — perhaps more
than any other leader in the world. From the day he took office, he
has been holding marathon press conferences from Monday to Friday,
starting at 7 AM and lasting for two or three hours. Called “La
Mañanera,” the conferences are broadcast live on public television
and streamed on a dedicated YouTube channel
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as well as directly on the president’s official website
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that an astounding ten million people watch the program.

Unlike scripted press events in the United States, these are
free-flowing discussions where the president talks in a folksy style
about everything from COVID-19, infrastructure projects, and the
migrant crisis to Mexico’s best foods and the cheapest places to buy
gasoline. He speaks in a slow, conversational tone, breaking down
political jargon into digestible concepts and taking unscripted
questions from the press.

AMLO insists that the two-hundred-year US domination of Latin America
has been exhausted and must come to an end.

Claiming that the mainstream media often misinform the public or
ignore key issues, AMLO ironically uses these press conferences to
bypass the media and take his message directly to the people. His open
style represents a fundamental break with the past, where presidents
went for years without taking an unvetted question from a reporter.

But AMLO is more than just a popular Mexican president; he has become
a leading progressive figure in the Americas. He has garnered support
and gratitude for bold actions he has taken in solidarity with
beleaguered leftist leaders and nations. After the Organization of
American States (OAS) sparked a coup against Evo Morales in 2019, AMLO
sent a plane to whisk Morales out of the country and offer him asylum
in Mexico. Morales credits AMLO with saving his life.

He has also offered asylum
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jailed whistleblower Julian Assange and recently suggested
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the Statue of Liberty should be dismantled and returned to France if
Assange is extradited and imprisoned in the United States.

A close friend of Cuba, AMLO sent much-needed shipments of food,
medicine, and fuel to the island during the height of the pandemic
and announced
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May 2022 that Mexico would hire more than five hundred Cuban doctors
to help make up for a shortage of medical professionals in rural
Mexico.

He has railed against the US sanctions on Cuba, calling them
“depraved
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and a key reason that Cubans are migrating. He said that the people of
Cuba deserve a “dignity award
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interference for over sixty years and that the entire country should
be declared a World Heritage site.

Mexico hosted
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between the Venezuelan government and that country’s opposition and
resisted US pressure to recognize opposition leader Juan Guaidó as
“interim president.”

AMLO’s hemispheric supporters also appreciate his recurring call
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the Spanish king and the Catholic Church to apologize for the conquest
of Latin America.

But AMLO’s position as a regional leader was really boosted by his
refusal to attend President Biden’s June 2022 Summit of the
Americas
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Los Angeles because of the exclusion of Cuba, Nicaragua, and
Venezuela. This had a snowball effect, prompting other heads of state
to skip the gathering and turning Biden’s summit into a flop
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The Summit of the Americas is closely associated with the OAS
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another institution AMLO has criticized, especially for its role in
the Bolivian coup
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AMLO has called for replacing the OAS with a truly autonomous body —
“a lackey to no one.” That substitute would be the Community of
Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC).

CELAC has only existed for ten years and, unlike the OAS, it includes
Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua but not the United States and Canada.
Its goal is to stimulate Latin American/Caribbean independence,
integration, and autonomy. Mexico’s 2021 hosting
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a CELAC Summit attended by almost all the leaders of the region gave
the body a huge boost.

AMLO and some other Latin American leaders have taken this concept of
Latin American integration a step further, calling
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a sort of European Union with a single currency and the right to cross
borders. It harkens back to the dream of Simón Bolívar to create a
unified Latin America.

When it comes to relations with the United States, AMLO walks a fine
line between railing against US policy toward Latin America and
maintaining a positive relationship — even under Donald Trump.
Mexico has no alternative, AMLO believes, because it shares a
2,000-mile border and there are, by Mexico’s government’s
calculations, some 40 million
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living in the United States. Even more than that, almost 80 percent of
Mexican exports go to the United States.

But AMLO insists that the two-hundred-year US domination of Latin
America has been exhausted and must come to an end.

“We are not a protectorate, a colony, or anyone’s backyard,”
he declared [[link removed]] in a
groundbreaking July 2021 speech. “We say ‘adios’ to the
impositions, interference, sanctions, exclusion, and blockades.”
Instead, he called for a relationship based on nonintervention,
self-determination, and the peaceful resolution of conflicts.

These ideas resonate across Latin America, especially with the new
left tide sweeping the continent — the election of President 
[[link removed]]Gustavo
Petro
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Colombia being the latest and most spectacular, given the country’s
close alliance with the United States. If Lula wins
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Brazil in the upcoming elections, the continent will be ripe for a new
regional architecture and setting its own terms for its relations with
the US. The continent will also be grasping for new models of
development that don’t rely on extractivism and corporate profits
but improving the quality of life and the environment. Millions across
the hemisphere will look to their new leaders, as well as AMLO and
CELAC, to help navigate that process.

_MEDEA BENJAMIN is cofounder of CODEPINK for Peace
[[link removed]] and author of several books,
including Inside Iran: The Real History and Politics of the Islamic
Republic of Iran
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_Subscribe to JACOBIN today [[link removed]], get four
beautiful editions a year, and help us build a real, socialist
alternative to billionaire media._

* Mexico
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* Latin America
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* United States
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* Andrés Manuel López Obrador
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* Politics
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* international relations
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* AMLO
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* OAS
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