United States and Elections in Our America

It is not at all novel, nor should it even be news, that the policy of the US empire is to seek to influence electoral processes in "Our America" in favor of its own interests.

However, until now, the implicated officials have usually denied these practices, invented all sorts of pretexts, or maneuvered to subtly manipulate public opinion on the matter.

But with the Trump administration, this sort of doctrine is being displayed with absolute shamelessness. The president himself does it all the time with his habitual "sincericide," a topic substantially covered, as does Mr. Rubio, a liar in his natural state, and if any doubt remained, we now have the statements from the Treasury Secretary, Mr. Scott Bessent—a position not typically used to speak on these topics.

Well, Bessent, in line with Trump, explained when questioned that the purpose of helping Argentina with 20 billion USD was to collaborate with Milei's recent electoral victory and, in passing, stimulate a kind of domino effect for other electoral contests in the Region. Within this narrative, they euphemistically label Milei a "regional beacon"—impressive.

And it's logical; the average American who might have been interested in this "aid" doesn't understand why money is given to Milei when there are so many needs in the US, aggravated by the longest government shutdown in history. The reaction of rejection within the Trump base was notable, made visible in the media by some of its leaders.

Trying to explain this circle squared, the Treasury Secretary expanded his discourse, indicating that the money to save Milei was not a bailout—something obvious—but rather a kind of business whereby the US will gain more than it is now disbursing.

If in the deepest part of his labyrinthine reflection, Secretary Bessent wanted to make it clear that it is not interference but help for friends on the continent, it would have been better not to expose so clearly that not even the latter is true—helping Milei—but rather a lucrative financial business for the empire, at the expense of the future of Argentinians.

Beyond the anecdotal nature of this matter, the relevant point is how it starkly reveals the currency of what they now call the "economic Monroe Doctrine," that is, imposing a candidate using pressure or the promise of specific benefits on the country targeted for that manipulation. To use a term "in fashion" in the Trump administration: achieving "peace through economic strength."

This sort of economic blackmail is expressed when Trump revives his absurdly famous tariffs, or threatens to eliminate some aid package, or suppress certain immigration programs.

Given the imminence of electoral outcomes, it is pertinent to highlight the cases of Chile, which holds presidential elections next Sunday the 16th, where the continuity of a progressive-style government is at stake, or the electoral situation in Honduras, which will elect a new president on November 30.

The Treasury Secretary remembered Chile, seen not as an independent and sovereign country, but as an important source of minerals, like lithium (they manage 40% of global production), the starting point of the US geopolitical dispute with China, which they say has subjected the current Chilean government to a "predatory agreement" to ensure monopolistic control of the mentioned mineral.

Either José Antonio Kast, the neo-fascist candidate who vindicates the murderer Pinochet and promotes a sell-off of the country to US transnationals, wins, or Chile will be subjected, at a minimum, to a substantial increase in tariffs and other sanctions without any justification—in the style of Brazil, when Trump raised tariffs on the South American country to 50% for condemning Bolsonaro.

In the case of Honduras, a dispute with the US also opened when the current president decided to establish full relations with the People's Republic of China, but also due to her government's sovereign stances in the international arena.

The candidate of the ruling Libre Party, Rixi Moncada, is under pressure that if they win—something undoubtedly deserved—then the 75,000 Hondurans residing in the US under the TPS umbrella would be automatically deported, impacting practically the entire population, as the total of Honduran migrants contribute no less than 26% of GDP in remittances. Other sanctions would be added to the above.

Emerging as a closing to this panorama is Colombia, where a change of leader will be contested in May 2026. It is superfluous to show the level of antipathy that President Petro generates in the White House; not only for his progressive stances but because he appears, beyond any doubt, as a formidable obstacle to involving his country in any invasive project against Venezuela.

The trajectory of the very likely candidate of a unified officialdom, Iván Cepeda, surely contributes to Washington's hostility, taking into account the trajectory of the now senator for the Historic Pact. It's as if the headaches that Petro provokes in the Secretary of State, Mr. Rubio, were prolonged to infinity, perhaps multiplied.

Although in the past, the case of Ecuador, which held elections (run-off) this past April, appears. The current government counts on the evidently interested support of Washington, for both strictly economic and especially geopolitical reasons, being a country located almost in the center of South America.

Evidence of this: there is already talk of reopening the US military base in Manta, the one that Correa opportunely closed in an emancipatory act in 2009, or even tarnishing the archaeological and touristic virtues of the Galápagos Islands with a vulgar settlement or base for US marines, ready to assault its neighbors. In exchange, the promise from Washington of tariff exemptions.

It is complicated to determine the extent of interference in Bolivia, where own errors, and probably induced ones, ended two decades of leftist governments, allowing the return of a recycled right, "daddy's boys" according to their surnames, who boast of being more right-wing than Trump himself, and proclaim the absurdity that they will install "capitalism for everyone."

In the context of this analysis, the customary misdeeds of the usual suspects could not be missing: the congressmen of Cuban origin, representatives from Florida. Not only because of the tons of digital words their assistants generate on social networks, with the characteristic anti-Cuban and, of course, ultra-right-wing bias, against progressivism and the left south of the Rio Grande.

But Congresswoman Salazar, surpassing herself, recently sent a letter to Secretary Mr. Rubio ranting about the US diplomatic personnel in Guatemala. Yes, as you read it; Salazar's enemies of the occasion were Ambassador Tobin Bradley and political counselor Daniel Fennell, eventually appointed during the Biden administration.

Mrs. Salazar, representative for the State of Florida, a place where it is said they are calling for her head for abandoning her constituents to their fate under systemic pressure from the migration police, expressed her rejection of Ambassador Bradley's support for "liberal" candidates (radical left according to Trumpism) for an upcoming reform of Guatemala's now corrupt judicial system. She accuses him of meddling in Guatemala's internal affairs.

It seems like a joke, coming from someone from the Cuban-American mafia, the same one that leads the threats against Honduras's Libre Party, to cite just one example of a country bordering Guatemala. And the most bizarre part, she makes public the letter sent to Mr. Rubio, mentioned above, demonstrating once again that "a confession of the party relieves the need for evidence."

In this climate of absurdity, it is pertinent to review US legislation itself, which categorically establishes the prohibition of another country interfering in its electoral processes.

For example, there exists law 1. 52 USC/ 30121, also 2. 18 USC/611 and 3. 18 USC/ 595, which specify interference by third parties, international financing, and other felonies directed from abroad associated with the development of an election. Some of these laws punish with 5 years of imprisonment and fines of up to one million USD those who incur this type of crime. The sanctions apply both to individuals and foreign governments.

On the other hand, from a broader perspective, it is important to highlight that this form of imperial interference, intolerable for their own country, is also a matter where the Proclamation of Latin America and the Caribbean as a Zone of Peace applies.

It must be clear, definitively, that rejecting this US interference is not an ideological question or a leftist or progressive stance; it doesn't matter that we know they have always done it, perhaps the original aspect now is that the protagonists of this imperial policy admit and expose it publicly as something natural. This explicit shamelessness is, therefore, an extraordinary opportunity for timely denunciation and political action to confront it.

Translated by Sergio A. Paneque Díaz / CubaSí Translation Staff