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lmunch

Biden needs to team up with Mexico (opinion) - CNN - 0 views

  • Last week's virtual summit meeting between President Biden and President Andrés Manuel López Obrador of Mexico was uninspiring, or at least the speeches were. Far more interesting was what the Mexican and American teams discussed before the presidents met.
  • Then, on the eve of the event, AMLO announced that he would submit an immigration proposal to the American side, modeled on the Bracero program, which sent millions of Mexican men to work on American farms from World War II until 1964. We don't know exactly what response he got, except for a vague comment from the White House that immigration issues had to go through Congress.
  • Together with AMLO's initiative, the two proposals are almost identical to the old immigration deal that Presidents Vicente Fox and George W. Bush worked on in 2001 and 2002, and which fell by the wayside after 9/11. They all resemble the bills that Senators John McCain and Edward Kennedy attempted to pass as comprehensive immigration reform, in 2006, followed by other refashioned and failed tries in 2007 and 2013, by Bush again and later by President Barack Obama.
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  • The second reason why the two plans must be melded into one is political. Democrats will never accept more temporary workers without the legalization of unauthorized foreigners. Republicans will not countenance any type of amnesty if growers, developers, landscapers and the health care industry are not placated by a significantly larger number of legal, low-wage, low-skill workers.
aleija

Opinion | Despite It All, López Obrador Has My Vote - The New York Times - 0 views

  • But this polarization is not new. Mexico stopped being one society a long time ago, splitting into two countries, so to speak, that struggle to coexist where they overlap. Both sides are genuinely convinced that their approach for ​​Mexico is the one that best suits the country. And they are both correct, except that they are talking about two different countries.
  • More than three decades of an economic model that increased inequality has led to the fragmented and unequal Mexican society that we see today. Given that the opposition has thus far been unable to offer an alternative to this model, I am convinced that Mr. López Obrador is our only viable option.
  • According to the National Institute of Statistics, 56 percent of Mexicans work in the informal sector and lack social security, and not by choice. Mr. López Obrador has enacted social programs that have benefited more than 20 million Mexicans, although it’s not enough for the estimated 52 million who live in poverty.
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  • Over the past 30 years, Mexico’s G.D.P. has grown at an average annual rate of only 2.2 percent, and there are enormous internal inequalities. The 10 richest people have the same wealth as the poorest half of the country, according to a 2018 Oxfam report.
  • In 2018, when Mr. López Obrador ran for the presidency for a third time, the indignation and rage of those left behind had reached a boiling point. The signs of discontent were visible: historically low approval of government performance and communities that were willing to take justice into their own hands. Mr. López Obrador offered a political pathway to dissipate this tension and won the election with more than 50 percent of the vote.
  • Since then he has radically increased the minimum wage; established about $33 billion in annual direct transfers and handouts to disadvantaged groups; and begun ambitious projects, like the Mayan train and the Dos Bocas refinery, in regions traditionally overlooked by central governments.
  • Many describe Mr. López Obrador’s style of governance and his social and economic projects as populist in nature.
  • But in short, Mr. López Obrador is a less radical politician than he’s accused of being and is more prudent with his management of government than he’s given credit for.
kaylynfreeman

Opinion | Can Biden Help Stem Mexico's Democratic Decline? - The New York Times - 0 views

  • MEXICO CITY — The year 2022 will mark 200 years of official relations between Mexico and the United States. But before we’re able to celebrate this milestone, we must first work to safeguard freedom, democracy and the rule of law in Mexico under President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s illiberal rule.
  • Mr. Biden would also do well to promote stricter gun laws to help stop the flow of guns from the United States. Mr. López Obrador, known as AMLO, in turn should dispel the uncertainty over Mexico’s energy sector, where new laws that strengthen the state-owned energy companies Pemex and C.F.E. and the use of fossil fuels, and that conflict with the U.S.M.C.A., have recently been passed.
  • Mr. Biden and Mr. López Obrador are both men of faith, and it was a good sign that symbols of the Mexican people, both religious and secular, were invoked in their meeting.
brickol

Why are these three presidents downplaying coronavirus warnings? - CNN - 0 views

  • Brazilians have been tricked by the media over a "little flu," according to president Jair Bolsonaro. Families should still go out to eat despite coronavirus fears, says Mexico's president Andres Manuél Lopez Obrador. And Nicaragua's leader Daniel Ortega has all but disappeared, while political marches and rallies continue.As global leaders race to contain the brutal threat of a growing pandemic, a triumvirate of denial has emerged in Latin America, with the leaders of Brazil, Mexico and Nicaragua downplaying the danger of a looming outbreak.
  • As confirmed cases have surged in recent days, AMLO, as the president is often called, has shown more concern, encouraging people to stay home. He said his cabinet will be working on ways to help vulnerable populations, providing relief to small businesses and banning gatherings of 100 people or more. But as recently as Sunday, he posted a video encouraging people to continue to go out to eat, urging Mexicans to limit any damage to the economy. "We do nothing good and we don't help if we're paralyzed, if we act in an exaggerated way," he said in the video. "Let's continue living life normally."
  • In the absence of a large federal response, the fight against the virus has largely fallen to Mexico's states, municipalities, and even private businesses. On Monday, Mexico City forced all bars, nightclubs, and movie theaters to close and banned gatherings of 50 people or more (though CNN witnessed lots of people still out on city streets Monday).
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  • When news emerged on March 12 that Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro's press secretary had tested positive for the virus, some hoped the president who described the novel coronavirus as "overrated" would take the viral threat more seriously.But he's only doubled down since then, calling the virus "a little flu" in a television interview on Sunday. "The people will soon see that they were tricked by these governors and by the large part of the media when it comes to coronavirus," he told Brazilian network Record TV, referring to the states of Sao Paolo and Rio de Janeiro, where governors have declared states of emergency.
  • And many Brazilians aren't buying Bolsonaro's reassurances. In cities across the country, residents go to their windows and balconies every night at 8:30pm, banging pots and pans to show discontent with Bolsonaro's administration.
  • As one of the western hemisphere's poorest nations, Nicaragua is in a worse position than most to fight off any potential outbreak inside its borders
  • Nicaragua's vice president, Rosario Murillo -- the wife of President Ortega -- has advised Nicaraguans to turn to religion in difficult times. "We can move forward serenely...responsibly, and above all believing in the Lord, knowing that this faith defends and saves us," Murillo said in the context of the coronavirus, according to state-run news agency Digital 19.The federal government has taken few preventative measures so far, only launching a public hygiene campaign while monitoring tourists from countries with a high number of cases, according to Digital 19. As a part of the hygiene campaign, the government sent workers door to door with instructions on how to properly wash hands.
delgadool

Biden Seeks Help on Border From Mexican President - The New York Times - 0 views

  • Mr. López Obrador won the admiration of President Donald J. Trump for cooperating with his hard-line immigration agenda, and the Mexican president praised Mr. Trump during a call with Mr. Biden, then the president-elect, in December.
  • Mr. Biden is now hoping that Mr. López Obrador will become a partner in preventing another cycle of out-of-control migration from Central America, but that he will do so without resorting to the full range of policies Mr. Trump embraced.
  • Mr. López Obrador recently called for a new guest worker program for Mexicans and Central Americans in the United States, although Mr. Biden’s press secretary said on Monday the move would require legislation from Congress.
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  • “The United States and Mexico are stronger when we stand together,” Mr. Biden said at the beginning of a virtual meeting with the Mexican president, while acknowledging that the countries have not been “perfect” neighbors. He said that during the Obama administration, “we looked at Mexico as an equal — you are equal.”
  • The conversation came after a tumultuous start between the two leaders
  • “What you do in Mexico and how you succeed affects the rest of the hemisphere,” Mr. Biden told him.
  • Mr. Biden is not using the rule to expel unaccompanied migrant children, a practice that under Mr. Trump caused families to scramble to find Central American children and violated a diplomatic agreement with Mexico. I
  • But even as Mr. Biden seeks to unwind those policies, Mr. Mayorkas acknowledged that the United States continued to rely, for now, on a measure at the heart of Mr. Trump’s approach: a public health rule that requires border agents to quickly deport border crossers to Mexico without a chance to request asylum.
  • The Biden administration has also formed a task force to unite parents separated from their children under Mr. Trump’s family separations policy
  • Republicans have already signaled that they intend to seize on Mr. Biden’s reversals of his predecessor’s immigration policies as a cornerstone in their efforts to take back Congress in 2022 and recapture the White House two years later.
  • While Mr. Biden is unwinding the Migrant Protection Protocols program that forced migrants to wait in Mexico for an adjudication in their asylum cases, he has kept another Trump-era rule in place that empowers border agents to swiftly expel migrants and turn them over to Mexican authorities.
  • Mr. Biden has made immigration one of his top legislative and diplomatic priorities, moving quickly to raise Trump-era limits on refugees who can be allowed into the United States and calling on Congress to pass a far-reaching bill that would give a path to citizenship to 11 million undocumented immigrants already living in the country.
  • Despite the emergency rule, border agents have for weeks released a limited number of families into communities in South Texas because of a change in Mexican law that has been the subject of internal discussions between Mexican and American government officials in recent weeks, according to a senior administration official.
  • At the same time, pandemic restrictions remain in place on nonessential travelers who have long stimulated the local economy along the border, he said.
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