Biden and López Obrador will have a tense face-to-face with migration and inflation in the background

Biden and López Obrador will have a tense face-to-face with migration and inflation in the background

López Obrador’s snub to Biden in June in the Summit of the Americas of Los Angeles, which he did not attend in protest at Washington’s refusal to invite the governments of Cuba, Venezuela Y Nicaraguahas disappointed the American political class.

López Obrador, pragmatic, downplays it: “It is a meeting to reaffirm our commitment to work together for the benefit of our peoples,” said the president on Monday, who before meeting with Biden will participate in a working breakfast with the vice president. kamala harris.

The visit is tinged with mourning for the tragedy of the more than 50 migrants killed in a trailer in Texasof which more than half were Mexican. A drama that sets the tone for dialogue: migration and security.

Migration, the central axis

López Obrador, who defends an agenda of cooperation programs for development, will probably ask Biden for more temporary worker visasespecially in the agricultural sector, and investments in some projects to stop migrant caravans.

A US government official who requested anonymity agrees that addressing irregular migration requires “opening up additional legal avenues.” But she added that the meeting will be more focused “on cooperation and the implementation” of agreements “and not so much on specific numerical commitments.”

And it is that as the Parliamentary election mid-term elections in November, in which the Democrats could lose control of the United States CongressBiden cannot afford to give the impression of an open border policy.

During his tenure, every month more than 200,000 people who tried to enter the country were sent back, invoking the program stay in mexicounder which asylum seekers are expelled to await the resolution of their cases on the other side of the border.

The two presidents will have to coordinate because this could change since the Supreme Court gave Biden one of the few joys of recent weeks, authorizing him to end that program inherited from the administration of donald trumpone of his campaign promises.

rising inflation

Beyond migration, the issue that really worries citizens is curbing inflation, of more than 6% in the United States and almost 8% in Mexico, and scaring away the ghost of recession.

Inflation is due to bottlenecks in the supply chain and war in ukrainewhich will also be discussed according to the White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan.

And, according to López Obrador, to the lack of production. “How is it produced, if there is no labor force?” he asked himself on Monday, referring to the labor shortage in United States.

Bilateral tensions

For Biden “the relationship with Mexico is a priority,” the official said. A priority that forces him to avoid disagreements, because there are plenty of reasons for tension.

The energetic reform Promoted López Obrador blocks billions of dollars of investments and is likely to trigger some controversy in the framework of the trade agreement USMCA.

And on July 4, the national holiday in the United States, the Mexican president came out in defense of the founder of Wikileaks, Julian Assangeprosecuted for a massive leak of confidential documents.

“If they take him to the United States and sentence him to the maximum sentence and to die in prison, we must begin the campaign to dismantle the Statue of Liberty,” said the president.

In any case, Biden “prefers to have him close than far” and both he and López Obrador “are old-school politicians who like to sit face to face, look each other in the eye and have a negotiation,” said Andrew Selee, president of the Migration Policy Institute, in a forum held by the US think tank Wilson Center.

After the meeting, López Obrador will pay tribute to the former president in the afternoon Franklin D Roosevelt and the defender of human rights Martin Luther King. On Wednesday he will hold a meeting with businessmen.

Source: Ambito

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