International
Latin America reacts to the resignation of Joe Biden’s presidential candidacy
The resignation from Joe Biden’s presidential candidacy has generated reactions in Latin America in different political sectors, from the left with Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, as well as on the right with allies of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.
“It has been the greatest honor of my life to be its president. And although my intention has been to seek re-election, I think the best thing for my party and for the country is that I retire and concentrate solely on fulfilling my duties as president for the rest of my term,” Biden, 81, said through a letter to the nation.
The president of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, said on Sunday that his US counterpart, Joe Biden, “has made the most sensible and correct decision” by leaving the race for re-election in the North American country.
“He has made the most sensible and correct decision, prioritized his family, his health, and realized that, at that age and with weakened health, he could not take the reins of his country and even less a presidential candidacy. It was a responsible attitude, President Biden,” Maduro said during an event held in the state of Barinas (west).
However, in his announcement, the US president does not mention his family or his health, and as an explanation of his decision he affirms the best thing for his country is that he retire and “focus only on fulfilling” his “duties as president during the rest” of the mandate.
Maduro also said he met his American counterpart, with whose Government he has maintained a “permanent dialogue” that, he said, is still active, with “dialogue commissions,” although he did not offer more details about the talks between the two countries, without diplomatic relations since 2019.
“I’m just telling you, President Biden, be calm with your conscience, because you made a wise and correct decision, and from Venezuela I, president of the republic, wish you health and long life, President Biden,” added the Chavista leader.
The Government of Panama said on Sunday that it “respects” the decision of US President Joe Biden to renounce the race for re-election in the elections on November 5, in which he was going to face former President Donald Trump.
“It is a personal decision of President Biden thinking about his country, his people and the Democratic Party. It’s time to respect her. We, as an allied country of the United States, are prepared to work with the administration that will be elected in November. We do not have any concern about what will happen in the next (US) elections,” said Panamanian Foreign Minister Javier Martínez-Acha, after being asked by journalists at a sporting event.
After a few hard weeks with growing criticism for the suitability of his candidacy, US President Joe Biden decided to abandon the race for re-election “for the interest” of the Democratic Party and his country, and offered his support to the vice president, Kamala Harris, who confirmed her intention to “get and win” the candidacy for the November 5 elections.
A few minutes later, Harris herself accepted responsibility and stated that she intends to “get and win” the Democratic nomination for the U.S. Presidency, although in the first hours of this historic Biden decision only a few voices offered explicit support.
Some ministers of the Government of the Brazilian President, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, praised on Sunday the decision of the President of the United States, Joe Biden, to give up his candidacy for the November elections.
“Politics is not personalism, but service in favor of ideas and values. Biden shows a huge demonstration of political greatness by understanding that Democrats need something new to face the extremist conservatism that threatens the world,” said the head of Planning, Simone Tebet, on her social networks.
Tebet, one of those in charge of tracing the economic strategy of the Brazilian Executive, also asked the Democrats to “have the same altruism and wisdom” as Biden when choosing his replacement “to face extremism,” that everything points to Vice President Kamala Harris.
The Minister of Agrarian Development, Paulo Teixeira, said, also on his social networks, that Biden’s resignation to continue in the presidential race is “a great decision to defeat the American extreme right,” which embodies, in his opinion, the former governor and Republican candidate Donald Trump.
For his part, the Minister of Transport, José Renan Filho, indicated that it is “a gesture of greatness” of the US president, who has been forced to withdraw from his candidacy after the strong pressure of the heavyweights of his party because of his state of health.
The Brazilian minister said that Biden has shown “no attachment” to the presidential candidacy “at a critical moment” and praised his management as U.S. president on issues such as employment, environmental protection and his country’s economic growth.
“This new fact will turn the election upside down,” he said.
Lula, for the moment, has not yet spoken publicly.
Allies of former far-right former president Jair Bolsonaro took advantage of the decision of the US president, Joe Biden, to resign from re-election, to criticize this Sunday the Brazilian head of state, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and the progressive forces.
“Biden is out! When is the ‘Brazilian Biden’ going to leave?” exclaimed, in apparent allusion to Lula, Senator Flavio Bolsonaro, one of the sons of former President Jair Bolsonaro and, like his father, aligned with the Republican candidate Donald Trump.
Senator Ciro Nogueira, a next ally of Bolsonaro and who was minister of the Presidency during his term (2019-2022), interpreted the news as “a victory of those who were gagged by a narrative that Trump was the absolute evil and Biden, the indisputable good.”
“Biden’s resignation (re-election) is an alert: they can lie once, twice, three times, but no one can prevent the truth from coming to light. It is the victory of the truth over the false and manipulative narratives of the left,” he said.
He also insinuated that former President Trump is a “political persecuted” for the various criminal cases he faces in the U.S. Justice.
“Biden leaves the campaign and enters the limbo of those who abused democracy on his behalf. A big day!” he concluded.
For her part, federal deputy Carla Zambelli, a relevant figure of the Brazilian far right, pointed out that Biden’s withdrawal from re-election has caused “the American left” to enter a state of “total despair.”
Jair Bolsonaro has not yet spoken publicly, nor has the current president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, so far.
International
Venezuela Refuses to Repatriate Citizens Amid Tensions Over Chevron’s Departure
The government of Venezuela privately warned the government of Donald Trump that it will not accept its own citizens being deported, following the United States’ decision to end Chevron’s license to operate in the Caribbean country, according to a report from The Wall Street Journal on Friday.
The newspaper, citing sources familiar with the matter, notes that the Venezuelan repatriation agreement is becoming strained after a January meeting between Trump’s envoy Richard Grenell and the Chavista leader Nicolás Maduro, who is not recognized as president by the U.S. The Chevron issue has exacerbated tensions.
On Tuesday, the Trump administration ended Chevron’s license in Venezuela and gave the company a month, until April 3, to leave the country after President Trump criticized Maduro for not accelerating the deportation of undocumented immigrants in the U.S. as quickly as expected.
The WSJ indicates that Venezuela’s private warning could further hinder Trump’s promised mass deportation campaignof undocumented immigrants, which his administration has already had to pause due to the high costs of using military planes for repatriation flights.
International
Hearing suspended in Guatemala on revocation of José Rubén Zamora’s house arrest
Guatemalan journalist José Rubén Zamora Marroquín will know until next week if he should return to preventive detention, after this Friday the hearing was suspended for a possible revocation of his house arrest.
The resumption of the hearing was rescheduled for next Monday, at 10:00 local time (16:00 GMT), by order of criminal judge Erick García, since, as he indicated, he lacks the case file for the moment.
The possible return of Zamora Marroquín to prison is due to a case of alleged money laundering in 2022, the year in which the Public Ministry (Prosecution), whose leadership is sanctioned internationally under allegations of corruption, began a judicial prosecution against him.
The journalist’s potential return to prison takes place after this week an Appeals Chamber revoked the house arrest measures that had been granted since October 2024 to the former owner and founder of the media El Periódico, a morning in which he uncovered more than a thousand cases of state corruption.
According to the opinion of the magistrates of the Third Appeals Chamber, there was “an error” in the resolution of the judge who decided to release the journalist last year. The review of the measures was requested by the Prosecutor’s Office.
Zamora Marroquín was detained for the case for more than 800 days, between July 29, 2022 and October 2024, without his guilt being proven to date.
Before this Friday’s hearing, the journalist recalled in statements to the media that he has complied with all the court orders regarding his house arrest, and reiterated that he has not seen his family for more than two years, since they are abroad in the face of the risks they could encounter in the Central American country.
Likewise, he added that the persecution against him has been “physical and psychological but I am not going to give up” and described the Third Appeals Chamber as a court linked to the “corrupt” and Deputy Felipe Alejos, sanctioned by the United States for corruption.
Zamora Marroquín, with 30 years of journalistic career, was arrested on July 29, 2022, just five days after issuing strong criticism for corruption against then-President Alejandro Giammattei, between 2020 and 2024, and his close circle.
The journalist remained in prison for a judicial process for alleged money laundering, which according to international organizations such as the Inter-American Press Society (IAPA) has been plagued with irregularities.
International
Trump withdraws 400 million federal funds from Columbia University for anti-Semitism
Donald Trump’s government canceled this Friday subsidies and contracts with Columbia University in New York worth 400 million dollars “due to its passivity in the face of the persistent harassment of Jewish students,” after receiving on Monday a report commissioned by the administration on anti-Semitism on the campuses of several universities in the country.
This cancellation “is the first set of actions, and new cancellations are expected,” warns a statement signed by the general administrative services, which specify that Columbia currently has 5 billion federally committed.
The decision to cut subsidies and contracts has been made together with the federal departments of Justice, Health, Education and Administrative Services, after the operational group commissioned by the government with the specific task of detecting and denouncing anti-Semitic behavior has not received a satisfactory response from Columbia, according to the statement.
Complaints of anti-Semitism began to appear in Columbia and other campuses shortly after October 7, 2023, the date on which Hamas launched a terrorist attack against Israel, which was then followed by a war declared by Israel against Gaza that has been one of the deadliest in several decades.
That war gave rise to demonstrations against Israel as they had not been seen on university campuses for fifty years, with Columbia at the spearhead, with some anti-Jewish incidents that made the Joe Biden Government intervene and summon the rectors of several universities to Congress, several of which (including Columbia’s) had to resign.
Despite the fact that the protests have dropped a lot in terms of intensity, Trump went further than Joe Biden: first, he named that operative group on anti-Semitism on campuses, and second, he threatened to withdraw visas or residence permits from students accused of supporting “terrorist organizations like Hamas.”
Secretary of Education Linda McMahon says that Columbia “for too long has left its homework with Jewish students on its campus, but today we show Columbia and the other universities that we will no longer tolerate that terrible passivity.”
And the director of the group that sent his report last Monday, Leo Torrell, abounded in the threats: “Freezing funds is one of the tools at our disposal to respond to this upsurge in anti-Semitism. This is just the beginning,” he said.
Curiously, in the protests against Israel, one of the most active groups has been the left-wing Jews, who have denounced that under the premise of anti-Semitism, legitimate political criticisms against the State of Israel are being included.
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