<mediadc-video-embed data-state="{"cms.site.owner":{"_ref":"00000161-3486-d333-a9e9-76c6fbf30000","_type":"00000161-3461-dd66-ab67-fd6b93390000"},"cms.content.publishDate":1654869826707,"cms.content.publishUser":{"_ref":"0000017f-e2f4-de00-a7ff-e7fff8030000","_type":"00000161-3461-dd66-ab67-fd6b933a0007"},"cms.content.updateDate":1654869826707,"cms.content.updateUser":{"_ref":"0000017f-e2f4-de00-a7ff-e7fff8030000","_type":"00000161-3461-dd66-ab67-fd6b933a0007"},"rawHtml":"
var _bp = _bp||[]; _bp.push({ "div": "Brid_54788932", "obj": {"id":"27789","width":"16","height":"9","video":"1029137"} }); ","_id":"00000181-4c3f-d405-a3e7-ddbfc7bf0000","_type":"2f5a8339-a89a-3738-9cd2-3ddf0c8da574"}”>Video EmbedLOS ANGELES — Warning signs flashed red as President Joe Biden prepared to host Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro in Los Angeles this week during a summit of Latin American leaders, with Biden’s counterparts questioning his claim to office and a White House aide promising no topic is off-limits in the sit-down.
Instead, the meeting with former President Donald Trump’s close ally went off without a hitch, while one of America’s closest regional allies led a boycott of the summit and set Biden up for a torrent of criticism over his decision to exclude the heads of three authoritarian states.
Biden could not escape the scorn of leaders who had gathered from across the Western Hemisphere for the Ninth Summit of the Americas, which the United States was hosting for the first time since 1994.
WHITE HOUSE: ‘WE DON’T REGRET’ WITHHOLDING AMERICAS SUMMIT INVITES FROM ‘DICTATORS’
But as the president met Bolsonaro for the first time on Thursday in a pared-back room at the Los Angeles Convention Center, he faced none of the heated rhetoric dominating the earlier plenary session.
Ahead of the highly anticipated Bolsonaro sit-down, Jake Sullivan, Biden’s national security adviser, had told reporters no subject was off-limits. The Brazilian leader had set tongues wagging during an interview this week when he cast doubt on the voting system in his country, where polls show him trailing in his bid for reelection, and questioned Biden’s 2020 win.
“I will not discuss the sovereignty of another country. But Trump was doing really well,” Bolsonaro said on Tuesday. “We don’t want that to happen in Brazil.”
Bolsonaro kept any speculation to himself on Thursday, and Biden, in brief remarks, praised Brazil’s “strong electoral institutions” and said the two countries shared deeply rooted values, an assessment his counterpart echoed.
Still, the two leaders did not shake hands in front of the cameras, and foreign reporters called their interaction awkward, speculating that the distance separating them was due to Bolsonaro’s choice not to get the COVID-19 vaccine.
Remarking how Biden had recalled visiting Brazil on two different occasions, including during the World Cup in 2014, one reporter called the comments “so Biden.”
The president has often touted his deep foreign policy expertise and relationships with world leaders as an asset, leveraging decades of visits for color when he meets with officials.
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Biden’s push to marshal Democratic reforms in the Western Hemisphere and elsewhere has prompted criticisms of his administration over press access, with aides accused of deliberately insulating the president from the media.
There will be no press conference at the conclusion of Biden’s multiday trip this week, a decision Sullivan defended when he told reporters that he did not view “the formal press conference issue” as a litmus test for Biden’s democratic bona fides.
Frustrations were evident on Thursday when, under a din of rolling “thank you”’s, White House aides moved to drown out reporters’ questions and usher them from the room with Bolsonaro.
“Turn around. Let’s go, guys. Thank you for coming. Thank you so much,” a Biden staffer said. “Thank you. Thank you guys for coming. Thank you, thank you.”
The mood, with Biden rarely meeting his counterpart’s eyes, stood in stark contrast to that of the American president’s nearly hourlong meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, whom he declared “a good personal friend.”
The two bilateral meetings — as Biden hosted some two dozen leaders and heads of delegations — were bright spots as talk of who was not present perfused chatter from the 70th-floor lobby of the InterContinental Hotel to the summit’s hallways.
When Biden dropped by an event with Vice President Kamala Harris on Thursday, reporters asked whether he was concerned that some leaders had chosen to skip out. Harris had expressed optimism about the relationships she was building in the Western Hemisphere since Biden tasked her with addressing the root causes of migration more than one year ago. Notably, several of those leaders stayed home.
“No,” Biden responded.
White House officials have downplayed the decision by Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and others to forgo the conference after the president decided not to invite Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela, a move Biden’s press secretary called a matter of principle.
Officials urged the public to focus on the outcomes of the summit’s meetings instead of dwelling on an attendance list.
“They are putting their name on the bottom line,” Sullivan told reporters. “It shows that they are invested in the agenda we have set forward.”
These efforts did little to quiet the sniping, with Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ) accusing Lopez Obrador on Thursday of attempting to blackmail Biden one day after the Mexican leader said the same of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman.
But behind the scenes, Biden’s top aides had worked for weeks to bring Lopez Obrador and the leaders of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras on board. All resisted.
El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele, declined to speak with Biden’s top diplomat, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, sources told the New York Times.
A source close to the Bukele administration defended the decision and argued that the White House’s objectives during the summit ran counter to the interests of Salvadorans and other workers on the continent.
“President Bukele has an approval rating of 80%. Biden has an approval rating of 30%. Why should Bukele take a call from this administration when 70% of Americans would not either,” the person said. “If the Biden administration wants Bukele to answer the phone, he should stop calling Bukele a dictator and admit that Biden’s foreign policy objective of attracting cheap migrant labor is not in the best interest of Salvadorans or Americans.”
The absences loomed large in Los Angeles, with Biden acknowledging the discord in closing remarks.
The summit was “off to a strong start,” the president said, “notwithstanding some of the disagreements relating to participation.”
Other leaders’ assessments were less charitable, with Argentine President Alberto Fernandez stating that Biden’s decision had cast a pall over the summit.
“The silence of those who are absent is calling to us,” the Argentine leader said. He urged a rules change that would prevent host nations from excluding other countries and told the president and assembled dignitaries how he “wished for a different Summit of the Americas.”
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
Belize’s prime minister, John Briceno, whom Biden had warmly greeted a day earlier, said excluding Cuba and Venezuela was “incomprehensible.”
Biden and the delegation heads are set to adopt a migration declaration on Friday, a major U.S. priority given the southwestern border crisis. After a working luncheon, he’ll turn his attention to domestic concerns, including a pair of Democratic National Committee events.
