Mexico’s Obrador wanted to lead Latin America, but ideology and careless rhetoric got in the way

By Mark Stevenson

President Andrés Manuel López Obrador took office in 2018 hoping to recover Mexico’s old reputation as the diplomatic leader of Latin America, but what he’s managed to do is get several of his country’s ambassadors kicked out of countries in the region.

On Friday, López Obrador doubled down after Ecuador ordered the Mexican ambassador out of the country a day earlier, vowing to send a military plane to remove the ambassador and pledging to continue the heated rhetoric. Previously, both Peru and Bolivia had withdrawn their ambassadors in similar disputes.

López Obrador acknowledged that more countries may expel Mexican diplomats because of his criticism of conservative governments, saying that was “because our posture is uncomfortable for the oligarchies of Latin America, and those that really run things, the foreign hegemonic forces.”

On March 25, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador

That sounds like staunch leftist rhetoric from the 1960s to the early 80s, the period López Obrador is nostalgic for, when Mexico’s old ruling party, the PRI, defended Cuba and helped start peace talks with leftist rebels in Central America. But the president hasn’t adapted to Latin America’s recent rapid swings from left to right.

“For a guy who’s really not interested in foreign policy, he’s got these pipe dreams of what Mexican foreign policy should look like,” said Arturo Sarukhan, Mexico’s former ambassador to the U.S. “It’s nostalgia, it’s the Mexico that he cut his teeth in as a politician, the PRI, it’s the typical PRI foreign policy of using Latin American as a foil vis-a-vis the U.S.”

While it sounds like just another of the president’s recurring, petty diplomatic disputes — López Obrador is famously uninterested in foreign policy and seldom travels or meets with other leaders — this one could escalate.

Mexico used its embassy in Ecuador to protect Jorge Glas, former vice president in the leftist government of ex-president Rafael Correa, who López Obrador really liked. Glas was fleeing two convictions and more investigations for corruption. Mexico upped the ante Friday by granting him asylum, and voiced fears — legitimate ones, as it turned out — that Ecuador could raid the embassy to arrest the former official, who is accused of corruption.

“The Mexican government rejects the increased presence of Ecuadorian police forces outside the Mexican Embassy in Quito,” the Foreign Relations Department said in a statement Friday. “This clearly constitutes harassment of the embassy and is a flagrant violation of the Geneva Convention.”

On Friday night, Ecuador responded by raiding the embassy and taking Glas into custody.

The whole spat started after López Obrador — who is known for making off-handed comments during his marathon-like daily news briefings — made insulting comments about current Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa, suggesting the conservative won office because “they created this climate of fear.”

López Obrador claimed the conservatives used the 2023 assassination of Ecuadorian presidential candidate and anti-corruption crusader Fernando Villavicencio, to swing the elections in Noboa’s favor and block the return of Correa’s leftist movement.

Obrador also attacked the credibility of Villavicencio, a journalist whose reporting on corruption issues has proven accurate.
Coming from a Mexican leader, the comments were particularly sensitive given that Mexican cartels are believed to be involved with many of the Ecuadorian gangs responsible for the exploding levels of violence in the South American country. López Obrador has a policy of not confronting the cartels.

But the comments also appeared to be insulting on a personal level to many.

Amanda Villavicencio, one of the daughters of the assassinated candidate, wrote in her social media accounts Thursday that “López Obrador, you should wash your mouth out before talking about my father. Fernando Villavicencio was killed by the mafiosos he always investigated, some of whom have taken refuge at your embassy and in your country.

The situation is complicated by the fact that things haven’t really been going López Obrador’s way in Latin America.

The former leftist president of Argentina, Alberto Fernandez, is one of López Obrador’s only close allies in the region, along with Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel, the only foreigner ever invited to speak at a Mexican Independence Day celebration. Fernandez was swept out of power in last year’s elections by radical libertarian and free-market proponent Javier Milei.

The other major diplomatic leader in Latin America, Brazil’s leftist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has been well ahead of López Obrador on adopting a neutral stance on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and condemning Israel for the war in Gaza. At one point he controversially compared Israel’s actions to the Holocaust.

In a sense, Lula da Silva is now much more of a leader for Latin America, just because he’s much more interested in foreign policy — and tries harder.

Since taking office in 2023, when he declared “Brazil is back!”, he has made 17 international trips, visited 28 countries in the Americas, Europe, Africa and Asia. López Obrador’s trips abroad can be counted on the fingers of one hand.

The other major diplomatic leader in Latin America, Brazil’s leftist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has been well ahead of López Obrador on adopting a neutral stance on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and condemning Israel for the war in Gaza. At one point he controversially compared Israel’s actions to the Holocaust.

In a sense, Lula da Silva is now much more of a leader for Latin America, just because he’s much more interested in foreign policy — and tries harder.

Since taking office in 2023, when he declared “Brazil is back!”, he has made 17 international trips, visited 28 countries in the Americas, Europe, Africa and Asia. López Obrador’s trips abroad can be counted on the fingers of one hand.
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Credit: Associated Press