 Thank you, Sharon. I'm introducing the next panel. We're very lucky to have the Mexico's former Secretary of Foreign Affairs Jorge Castaneda Goodman, who is also the author of America Through Foreign Eyes. He's a former Bernard Schwartz fellow at New America in conversation with Isabelle McGoya. She's the stakeholder manager for the U.S.-Mexico Foundation. She's also a Future Tense Research Fellow at New America. And they are going to talk about what should the future of U.S. policy in Latin America be over to you, Isabelle. Thank you. Thank you so much, Peter. Before I start, I just want to remind the audience that we will be using Slido to submit our questions. Slido is the box located on the right on the video. And if you're under issues, please contact New America at events at neoamerica.org. It is my honor to be here and to have the opportunity to have this conversation with you, Dr. Castaneda. You know, when I moved from Mexico City to Washington, D.C., to study American Foreign Policy at Johns Hopkins Heights, I was really excited and looking forward to have this class debate, some passionate conversations about the U.S.-Mexico and U.S.-Latin American Relationship. And I was like, well, I'll get to know what the Americans are plotting against our countries. And let me tell you, it has been very humbling, a very humbling experience to be here as a Mexican. There isn't much debating or plotting about Latin America. The news, politics, classes, all are dominated by China, Russia, the Middle East, North Korea. And I think we haven't spent a whole week discussing Greenland and the potential purchase by the U.S. So despite our geographic proximity, beyond the talk about a border wall with Mexico, Latin America seems to be at the bottom of the to-do list of American diplomats and policymakers. So after two years in D.C., fighting an uphill battle, trying to explain why Latin America is important, I feel like this conversation is going to be like free therapy for me. So 20 years ago, it did seem like the U.S. government was ready to prioritize the ties with the hemisphere in a way that we have never seen before. And you, at a time, you were Mexico's foreign minister and you visited Washington, D.C. with President Vicente Fox in early September. And we tend to forget how close we were to a new immigration deal and to expanding NAFTA with President George Bush. And then just one week later, 9-11 happened and everything changed. So here we are. 20 years later, the world has changed a lot since the terrorist attacks. But what seems constant is the lack of engagement of the United States with Latin America. So I was wondering if you would like to start this conversation with a brief reflection on how the world changed with 9-11, specifically the policy towards Latin America, and whether you see the current moment as another opportunity for Washington to recalibrate its priorities and be more intentional in its strategy in the hemisphere with all the instability and dangers to democracy through Latin America, during all the alarms be sounding at the White House, the State Department and the Pentagon. Well, Lisabeta, thank you. Yes, 20 years ago was a different situation. I think there was a possibility of establishing a new relationship, at least with Mexico, and perhaps with some of the Central American countries and the Caribbean. That, as you say, was swept away by 9-11. And really, there hasn't been an opportunity like that ever since then. Today, the interesting part of the opportunity that may be there is that the Biden administration, in many ways, is carrying out domestic policies that can be seen as very encouraging and very promising for Latin America, as even, I would say, an example for Latin America to follow, because the agenda is very similar. The United States is now trying to rebuild or build a proper welfare state deserving that name. And Latin America is facing pretty much the same challenge in country after country. So in that sense, I think this is a wonderful window of opportunity for Latin America and many countries to come closer to the United States and vice versa. But what you say is absolutely true. There are serious threats to democratic rule in Latin America today. We see it in the countries where these threats have been present before or have materialized already, Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Bolivia to a lesser extent, but still today. And in countries that are also beset by populist threats to democratic rule, mainly Brazil, which is becoming increasingly worrisome, but also issues in other areas of the region, perhaps Peru, perhaps Mexico, certainly El Salvador. So yes, I think people in the White House and at the State Department should be worried and should be paying attention. The good news is today, I think the Assistant Secretary for Inter-American Affairs was finally ratified by the Senate. And so that will make things easier, but certainly they should be looking closely at what's going on. And you think that the Biden administration, we're already eight months into the Biden administration. Do you see a significant improvement at the significant difference between the previous administration with what we see today? Because I see a lot of talking and sometimes not very actionable strategies. Well, there's a lot of talk, which is the right talk, but doesn't mean much. But unfortunately, on policy, the Biden administration's policy resembles that of President Trump's, remarkably. In two ways. One, there is only one issue that the Biden administration has with Latin America and it's immigration. Immigration policies or migration policies are remarkably similar to Trump's. It's a kinder, gentler Trumpism. They don't threaten, they don't bully, they don't insult people because these are nice people, they're decent people, the Biden folks. But the policy is pretty much the same. Have the Mexicans do the dirty work for the Americans and have the Northern Triangle countries do the dirty work for the Mexicans. That's pretty much what Trump did. So I'm not sure that there's that much of a difference. I regret this enormously. I think this is very disappointing. But basically, it boils down to pretty much the same thing. Exactly. And the Biden administration, they have been pretty vocal about they're going to fix the roots that cause migration. But there's something very important called climate change, that every day is causing massive influx of migrants into the United States. And do you see a real commitment from the Biden administration to address those roots, but that they go beyond there? It's not about just bringing money into these countries, it's about building a real state for people to stay in the country. So do you think that if the Biden administration continues with this paternalistic, if we want to say approach to migration, you think it's going to change something in the future considering that climate change is the biggest threat right now? Well, climate change is a big, big threat, obviously, all over the world. And in particular, for example, in the Northern Triangle countries and in certain regions of Mexico, there's no question about that. But this is not the only driver of migration. It is violence, it is corruption, it is the lack of economic opportunity. And by the way, all of these things are true, as true for Mexico as for Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala. There is no difference really. The Biden administration tries to make Mexico look different. It's not different. Between 40% and 50 and half of the people who are detained at the border by CPP are Mexican males, single Mexican males. The Americans don't like to say that because they want President Lopez Obrador of Mexico to keep doing the dirty work. And so they want to have Mexico on its side. But the issues are practically the same. When I hear people in the State Department or in the NSC saying that they want Mexican cooperation to fight corruption in Guatemala, please hello, we teach corruption. We don't teach anti-corruption. We have PhDs in corruption in Mexico. And this government is not any different from previous governments. So it's a little bit silly in terms of showing the posing the problems in that way. The fundamental issue is that the root causes must be addressed. That's a good idea. But that's a very long-term idea. The real issue is what you do tomorrow morning when roughly a thousand people will try to cross the border without papers. And where you're going to send them back to Mexico in terrible conditions. Are you going to process their request for asylum in the United States? Are you going to send them back to Guatemala where they can all be killed? What are you going to do with them now, not 10 years from now? Correct, exactly. And to all the policymakers that they're watching us right now, could you share some pointed ideas that can be implemented moving forward? So in 20 years, we have a safer and a better relationship that truly embodies democratic values that seem to be in danger throughout the region right now? Well, I think the Biden administration should really ensure that it is different, but in the right way of being different from the Biden people, from the Trump people. In other words, it's not a question of listening to the autocrats or the pseudo-autocrats. It's not a question of just looking the other way while they do whatever they want as long as they deliver on the one, two, or three issues that the United States is interested in. On the contrary, I think the U.S. should have a very proactive policy in Latin America, not a nation-building policy, not a policy to bring about regime change in Cuba or Venezuela or Nicaragua because that won't work, but a policy where American values or Western values or liberal values are pushed actively by an administration that believes in them domestically, doesn't necessarily believe in them internationally, but it does believe in them domestically, fighting against corruption, fighting against poverty, fighting against inequality, fighting against the lack of a social safety net, fighting for human rights, defending democracy collectively. President Biden has wisely called for an international conference later this year, at the end of this year, sort of community of democracies or to defend democracies. Fine. But what's he doing about defending democracy, at least rhetorically, in Brazil, in Mexico, more actively in Nicaragua, in El Salvador? In other words, there has to be a push for really the Biden administration's values. And if that gets in the way of more immediate American interests, try and have a two-track policy. The United States is having a two-track policy with Russia and with China. Why not with Mexico and Brazil? And what would that double-track policy would look like? It would be on the one hand to speak out on issues that are important. And then on the other hand, engage with these countries on matters that can be engaged with, but not sacrificing principles and values to expediency. Talking to the Brazilians about the issues that they, that speaking out to the Brazilians on the Amazon, on the environment, on human rights, on elections, although Jake Sullivan did something like that when we visited Brasilia a few weeks ago, but being much more explicit about it without being strident. And at the same time, engaging with the Brazilians on issues, for example, like Huawei and Chinese involvement in Brazilian 5G, and engaging with Brazil on trade, engaging with Brazil on other issues like the environment, but speaking out also on what they're doing in these matters. The same with Mexico, corruption in Mexico, human rights in Mexico, the war on drugs in Mexico, engage on migration and speak up and speak out on these other issues. And we could go down the list country by country. Exactly. But I think that the biggest problem and probably the most difficult question is, how do you engage with the region without being considered like an intervention? The American imperial is coming to us. So where is that fine line between engaging without like violating the country's sovereignty? Well, to begin with, many countries in Latin America, most countries in Latin America, for example, have signed a series of conventions or treaties or statements that make the defense of human rights or the defense of democracy a collective multilateral issue. Just three days ago on 9-11, we celebrated the 20th anniversary of the signing of the Inter-American Democratic Charter in Lima. Colin Powell and I were among the signatories at the time. This is something that every Latin American country has accepted. So the definition of intervention, the definition of imperial involvement has changed over the years. The United States, for example, could consider once again the Biden administration is very well suited for this, consider once again signing the so-called San Jose Pact or American Convention on Human Rights from 1968, which it has never ratified. And we could go on like that with a series of issues on corruption. For example, it's wonderful to fight corruption. And all governments in Latin America want US support and cooperation and fighting corruption. But not just the guys that the Americans don't like, not just the Venezuela or Nicaragua. Yeah, that's fine. But what about the corrupt guys in Mexico and in Guatemala and in El Salvador and in Honduras? What are you going to do about them? And we could go again down the list in Colombia. What about human rights violations in Colombia? What about corruption in Colombia? And we could go on like this. So the definition of what you call imperialism or interventionism has changed over the years. And many Latin American countries prefer cooperation with the United States and dealing with the United States and don't see that cooperation as interventionist. Correct. And maybe also the next most important question, how do we keep Latin America relevant? Because we don't want to be falling through the cracks with the State Department that they're concerned about China and Russia. How do we keep our region relevant beyond the migration issue? Well, that's a Latin American concern. And I'm certainly glad to focus on it for a second. But does it really have that much to do with the US? Latin America cannot be relevant if it does not speak with a single voice. That's very difficult today because we have countries that are ideologically with governments that are ideologically worlds apart. You have Mexico, Argentina, Nicaragua, Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia on one side, and you have Brazil and Chile and Colombia. Peru we will see now, but these other countries, Uruguay, Costa Rica on the other side. It's very difficult to speak with one voice when you have such great ideological and political differences. At the same time, there are many issues on which theoretically these countries could speak with one voice. If the Brazilians, for example, were to become a bit more sensitive to these matters on the environment and climate change, on fighting corruption, which at least rhetorically is something that everybody agrees upon, defending human rights. Obviously, you can't count on the Cubans or the Venezuelans or the Nicaraguans or the Salvadorians on that matter, but you should be able to count on the other large countries on issues. Just stick with those. The main point is Latin America has to speak with one voice. There are many people now among them, several trillion former officials and intellectuals who have been trying to build the notion of active non-alignment or proactive non-alignment as a new form of Latin American non-alignment between the United States and China, but with an active voice, not a passive one, like was the case of the non-aligned movement many years ago. Correct. And as a follow-up question, I have one from the audience that says, the Biden administration has been slow to nominate ambassadors, including too many Latin American countries. What kind of message does that send? Well, I think it's been slow with everybody. And we just knew Aceter in Mexico, Ken Salazar, who just arrived a couple of days ago, and I think he's going to be very welcome and will do a great job. A couple of others have been also nominated, including at the OAS, but in general, the Biden administration has been moving very slowly. It's true, but I wouldn't see it as a reflection of the priority of Latin America on the agenda. And we have just two minutes left. So two brief sentences. What should be the U.S. foreign policy towards Latin America in the next 20 years? Well, in the next 20 years, I think, of course, that goes way beyond the Biden administration. I think it should go in the direction of trying to help Latin America become the type of societies that Latin America has been seeking to build for many years and in many different ways with some success and with some failures. The United States today, and this is a point I make in my book, America through Foreign Eyes, the United States today is facing the challenge of reducing inequality, of facing up to its history of slavery, of what happened with the Native American population, of what happened with Mexico, etc. It's facing up to this like never before. It is trying to build a social safety net that will really protect everybody, to deliver health care to everybody, to end many of the aspects of systemic racism and violence. All of those things, the U.S. should export those ideas. Soft power is what makes American civilization, not American empire, American civilization powerful and promising and attractive to everybody. In the competition with China in Latin America, the U.S. can win hands down if it promotes the current values, the current promises and challenges of American civilization, not those of the Trump administration, not those of the Bush administration, but those of today of the progressive wing of the Democratic Party. Thank you so much for such a powerful conclusion and thank you to New America and Arizona State University.