Joe Biden Could Suffer Defeat in South America

President Joe Biden could suffer another serious diplomatic failure at next month’s Summit of the Americas. The New York Times wrote that Washington’s goal in hosting the June summit, which will be in Los Angeles, is to showcase the resurgent leadership of the U.S. in the region.

Still, right now, the organization of the event is looking like a blunder as more and more leaders of Latin American and Caribbean nations are considering not even showing up to the summit.

A member of Congress told the newspaper that the summit’s agenda does not have specific objectives yet. Preliminary meetings were marked by confusion. Multiple regional representatives noted that immigration was clearly missing from the agenda. This last one is not surprising since the Biden administration’s most important priorities for the summit start with democracy and climate change, among others.

Uncertainty around the participants is also huge. According to some sources, Washington does not want to invite some leaders, mostly from Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela. Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador announced earlier that he is willing to attend the summit only if every American country participates. Next to Obrador, presidents of Bolivia and Honduras, as well as some nations of the Caribbean community, threatened Washington with their absence. On top of that, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro also announced that he will not participate in the summit, without giving a reason.

Experts say the point of their resistance is to show that Washington can no longer boss them around. Equal states will be meeting at the summit: Washington cannot make unilateral decisions regarding its participants.