Exclusion of Central American nations at Biden’s democracy summit sets off alarm bells
President Joe Biden’s Summit for Democracy started Thursday without the presence of eight Latin American and Caribbean nations, an absence that highlights both the backsliding of democratic values in the region as well as his administration’s challenges in a crucial area where setbacks can have an immediate impact on U.S. national security and domestic politics.
Whether because of the autocratic nature of their governments, alleged connections to drug trafficking, dubious democratic credentials, or attacks to democratic institutions, the governments of Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Bolivia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Haiti have not been invited.
In particular, the absence of the Northern Triangle countries — El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras — a region promoted by the administration as a top priority when it took office and at the center of its efforts to stem the tide of migrants coming to the border, has raised alarms.
Former Costa Rican President Luis Guillermo Solis Rivera called it “doubly worrisome.”
“On the one hand, it reaffirms the deterioration of the region’s political systems and their governments, whether they are autocratic, denounced for having links with organized transnational crime organizations, or disrespectful of the rule of law and the administration of justice,” he said. “On the other hand, if we add the Nicaraguan dictatorship, it indicates that most of the Central American countries [four out of seven] are already out of favor with the United States.”
That, he added, can “seriously” affect the entire region, especially concerning the Free Trade Agreement, investments and integration within the Central American Integration System (SICA).
Solis said the decision, however, is consistent with Biden’s views on how to deal with governments whose practices lack transparency.
But other experts questioned the lack of engagement with the Northern Triangle nations regarding the summit.
“No one expected Cuba, Venezuela or Nicaragua to be invited to the democracy summit. All three are dictatorships and commit egregious human rights violations,” said Michael Shifter, the president of the Inter-American Dialogue. But “from the perspective of U.S. policy and democracy promotion, the decision to leave out these three [Northern Triangle] governments is surprising.
“Of course, their political systems have decayed; they have populist, corrupt leaders and spreading criminality,” he added. “But especially in light of the Biden administration’s inclusive approach to extending invitations, stigmatizing them does not make sense. It is hard to figure out what the U.S. gains. Though deeply flawed, all are important to the United States.”
During his presidential campaign, Biden pledged to invest $4 billion in Central America in an ambitious plan to address the root causes of migration. Almost a year into his administration, the deteriorating situation in that region has put a question mark on those plans.
By not inviting Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras to the summit, “the administration is sending a signal that the whole Northern Triangle strategy isn’t working,” said Eric Farnsworth, vice president of Americas Society/Council of the Americas.
Farnsworth, who hosted Guatemala’s president, Alejandro Eduardo Giammattei, in Washington on Tuesday, said by putting the leaders of Guatemala, El Salvador and the incoming president of Honduras in the same basket as Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega, it says that the administration doesn’t “have a very nuanced policy.”
“These are precisely the countries that have the deepest problems and that the United States really needs to work with on issues close to our agenda like immigration,” he said. “There seems to be a mismatch there.”
In a press briefing before the summit, Uzra Zeya, Under Secretary for Civilian Security, Democracy, and Human Rights at the State Department, downplayed the absence of the Northern Triangle countries, saying that invitations do not signal U.S. approval.
But she later added that the U.S. has concerns “with respect to the direction of the rule of law and governance and anti-corruption efforts” in those nations.
Brian Nichols, assistant secretary of state for the Western Hemisphere, mentioned some of those concerns in a Senate hearing on U.S. policy toward Latin America and the Caribbean last week. He included Salvadoran President’s Nayib Bukele’s efforts to concentrate power and “weaken democratic principles and institutions”; the Guatemalan attorney general’s obstruction of investigations into corruption; and the violence preceding recent elections in Honduras. Not mentioned was that a U.S. court handed down a life sentence to the brother of Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández for drug trafficking.
Still, in the same Senate Foreign Relations committee’s hearing, Virginia Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine was perplexed by Biden’s snub of the Northern Triangle nations and the lack of consultation from the administration on the summit’s plans.
“We have invested millions and millions of dollars in this region, and yet none of the Northern Triangle nations have been invited to participate,” he said. “I am a little bit surprised that no one I know in the Senate has received any outreach about what we think of the topics that should be brought up in the summit.”
Kaine pointed out that “much” of the immigration crisis at the border and the drug trade “that ravages our communities” have been driven by instability in the Northern Triangle. “This is usually an important region for us,” he said.
The decision to exclude the Central American nations could also prove “counterproductive,” Shifter said.
“Cooperation with the U.S. on migration might become more difficult,” he said. “The governments will probably become more defiant toward Washington and draw closer to China, which is looking to gain influence in the region.”
The summit’s guest list became a headache for the Biden administration, which has been criticized for both excluding and including governments with questionable democratic credentials. The two-day virtual gathering will include livestreamed interventions by some of the more than 100 foreign leaders invited.
The State Department said in a statement that the summit aims to set forth “an affirmative agenda for democratic renewal and to tackle together the greatest threats democracies face today.” It is unclear what concrete results are expected from the event. The State Department said participating countries are expected to announce “new commitments, reforms and initiatives.”
Latin American observers pointed out that the invitation process has not seemed consistent and politics might have played a big part.
Nichols repeatedly avoided criticizing Mexico and Brazil, whose populist presidents have been invited to the summit despite concerns about their increasing authoritarianism, Mexico’s energy and counternarcotics policies, and doubts about the fairness of the forthcoming elections in Brazil.
Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has also defied U.S. policy on Cuba, extending economic aid to the communist island and providing a high-profile platform to Cuban leader Miguel Díaz-Canel during Mexico’s independence celebrations to attack the Biden administration after the Cuban government crackdown on July 11 protesters.
But on Monday, the Biden administration officially restarted the controversial Migrant Protection Protocols at the southern border to comply with a federal judge’s ruling, for which it needed to secure Mexico’s support.
Others are puzzled by the exclusion of Bolivia but not Paraguay, which is also ranked low in Freedom House’s democracy rating.
And not inviting Guatemala’s president “begs the question, ‘Is Guatemala less democratic than Mexico? Are they less democratic than Pakistan, which got an invitation?’ ” Farnsworth asked.
“But how do you take this and go to the Summit of the Americas next year having not invited eight countries? That’s a quarter of the hemisphere almost,” he said. “Who’s even going to be on the guest list? Some very real pragmatic issues will need to be resolved that I don’t think have been clearly thought through.”
New Jersey Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, urged the Biden administration to use the summit to tackle democratic backsliding in the Western Hemisphere, which he said during the hearing is at “a critical inflection point.”
“The upcoming Summit for Democracy presents an opportunity to coalesce around a global strategy to confront repressive regimes and strengthen democracies,” he said. “It is my sincere hope that it produces tangible outcomes.”
This story was originally published December 9, 2021 at 6:30 AM.