Xavier Milei returned exultantly from the United States. He got a photo with the usual thumbs up next to donald trump in his mansion in Mar-a-Lago, and that he dedicated a few words to him: “Javier, I want to congratulate you for the work you have done, of making Argentina great again. It is incredible how you are fixing it and it is an honor that are here.”
The reception occurred at the event organized by the think tank conservative America First Policywhere businessmen and part of Trump’s newly appointed cabinet attended. Several informally greeted the Argentine president, as the vice president and possible successor J.D. Vance, the National Security Advisor, Mike Waltzor the one now responsible for the Government Efficiency department, elon Muskwith whom Milei already has several photos.
Milei, the only invited president, spoke in the mansion converted into the White House ad hoc since Trump’s victory on November 5. “Today the world is much better because the winds of freedom are blowing that are much stronger. A true miracle and reliable proof that the forces of heaven are on our side,” he said, visibly moved, before his microphone was cut off without advance notice before Trump’s arrival.
Milei’s trip, the seventh to the United States in less than a year in office, served to be recognized by the next president whom you openly admireannounce an even greater subordination of Argentina to the orbit of Washington, and advertise itself as a leadership that is growing internationally.
For Trump, who is preparing his triumphant return to the White House in January with a cabinet marked by hostility against the Chinese government, it was another signal that anticipates what his policy towards Latin America will be.
The Marco Rubio factor
The appointment at the head of the Department of State of Frame Blond ratified on the one hand the aggressive policy towards Beijingand on the other an importance towards Latin America in view of Rubio’s own political career. The son of Cubans born in Florida, a Republican political bastion, is characterized by his strong confrontation with several Latin American governmentsespecially those from Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela.
Rubio has starred in key episodes in recent years, such as in 2019 when the United States recognized Juan Guaidó as “interim president” of Venezuela. Rubio then visited the Southern Command and the border between Colombia and Venezuela at the forefront of what ultimately resulted in a political defeat for Guaidó and the team in charge of the mission in Washington.
His hostility towards the left in the region expands, for example, to Colombia, where he had several back-and-forths with the president. Gustavo Petro. He stated in 2019 that Rubio was “an expression of the most retarded sectors of American politics.” and has helped build a violent foreign policy,” while the next Secretary of State This year he accused Petro of being a “spokesman for murderers and criminals” for his position before the government of Israel, and “endangering two decades of progress in Colombia.”
“Marco Rubio expresses the Hispanic, Latino sector of Florida, strongly conservative, he has a fundamental view on Latin America, affirming its subordination to the United States, the hegemony of the United States in the Western Hemisphere. It embodies that policy that combines Trump’s intention to advance against China as a central axisand adds this very important point of a much stronger assertiveness of maintaining continental primacy that is threatened by the presence of China and other powers,” he explains. Gabriel Merinoprofessor and researcher at Conicet of Argentina, in dialogue with Public.
This “threat” from China to US hegemony was materialized this Thursday, November 14, with the inauguration of the Chancay megaport, in Peru, built with Chinese capital. The president Xi Jinping was at the inauguration of what will be the largest port in the South Pacific, key in trade between both continents.
But the concern of Washington and in particular of Rubio on the continent also comes from what Merino describes as “more autonomous processes”as in the case of the Brazilian president Lula da Silvaa key actor in BRICS politics and in the perspective of potential Latin American (re)integration.
Weapons, pressures and tariffs
“I think there will be great progress and a militarization of policy towards Latin Americathat is, a reinforcement of the Monroe Doctrine, proposing areas of influence at a global level, relative withdrawal in other places, and reinforcement of the attempt to control over Latin America. Milei is very functional about that, almost not asking for anything,” he says. Leandro Morgenfelduniversity professor, specialist in relations between the United States and Argentina, in dialogue with Public.
“The importance that Argentina may have for Trump is solely from a geopolitical point of view and political-ideological affinity with the Milei government, in the sense that it will allow him to drive a wedge between the countries of the region, attack all the non-aligned governments. Milei’s proposal for a free trade agreement with the United States would directly blow up Mercosuris going to be part of the offensive led by Rubio,” he explains.
However, “The big question is how much of this evident affinity can be translated into economic aid.. I do believe that he can intercede with the Treasury Department to have a favorable position in an IMF renegotiation with Argentina and in that sense he can replicate the Trump 2018 policy with Mauritius Macrian agreement with the IMF based on the geopolitical need of the United States.”
The question about the economy takes on particular importance in the context of a president who will take office under the promise of raise tariffs by 10% on all imports, and 60% in the case of Chinese ones. The man in charge of carrying out the reins of the economy will be Robert lighthizerwho started with Ronald Reaganwas the United States Trade Representative between 2017 and 2021, is a fervent opponent of globalization, and defender of the need for the US to once again be a production economy.
Lighthizer maintains not only the need for a strong tariff policy against China, something continued by the outgoing administration of Joe Bidenbut to separate the two economies in the most important sectors. The deepening of what Trump started.
What will be the economic position of Latin America in the face of this announced tariff increase policy? This is a particularly critical question for countries that maintain a large trade flow with the United States, such as the case of Mexico, with more than 3,000 kilometers of common border, where it assumed Claudia Sheinbaum as president at the beginning of October.
There are still two months until Trump enters the front door of the White House again, with more votes, power, and experience than the first time. And, as his cabinet reveals, also a greater radicalism than during his first season in Washington.
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