Summit of Americas Collapsing: Region Says NO to Exclusion of Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua
The Socialist Program with Brian Becker
The Socialist Program
4.7 • 587 Ratings
🗓️ 19 May 2022
⏱️ 55 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The Summit of the Americas being held next month in Los Angeles is shaping up to be a humiliation for the Biden administration. In response to the United States’ attempt to exclude Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua from the gathering, leaders in Bolivia, Mexico and Caribbean states plan to boycott. And activists in Los Angeles along with others throughout the country and the hemisphere are planning a People’s Summit for Democracy as a counter-event to demand an end to U.S. aggression against Latin America and highlight the people’s struggles against injustice inside the United States itself.
Brian is joined by Manolo De Los Santos, the co-executive director of The People’s Forum in New York, and a longtime popular educator.
Please make an urgently-needed contribution to The Socialist Program by joining our Patreon community at patreon.com/thesocialistprogram. We rely on the generous support of our listeners to keep bringing you consistent, high-quality shows. All Patreon donors of $5 a month or more are invited to join the monthly Q&A seminar with Brian.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Guess who's not coming to Joe Biden's Summit of the Americas in Los Angeles in June? |
| 0:07.0 | Well, it's a growing list. |
| 0:10.0 | We need a new system. We need a new society. |
| 0:14.0 | We need to demand that which may have sounded impossible even a few weeks ago, |
| 0:19.0 | but is not only realizable, but an imperative necessity. Welcome to The Real Story on the Socialist program. I'm your host, Brian Becker. |
| 0:50.6 | Today we'll be talking to Manolo de los Santos. He's the co-executive director of the People's Forum. |
| 0:57.1 | He's also a researcher with Tri-Continental Institute. Manolo, welcome. |
| 1:02.4 | It's a pleasure to be on your show. |
| 1:04.3 | Well, it's your second time. You're back. I'm honored. Thank you. |
| 1:08.6 | Manolo, I had asked you earlier, is the summit of the America's Joe Biden's hosting? |
| 1:14.8 | Is it off the wheels? And you said, no, it's not just off the wheels. It's a complete failure at this point. |
| 1:20.6 | A complete failure. I mean, you have the American delegation rushing to Mexico City to meet with Amlo, the head of state in Mexico, because he says he's not |
| 1:29.9 | coming. Let's just talk about the background and what's gone wrong so far for the Biden administration. |
| 1:34.9 | Well, I think the phone lines at the White House have been quite busy over the past few weeks |
| 1:39.0 | because different Latin American governments, not just of the left, I would say many in the center, |
| 1:45.7 | many in the right, have been calling the White House and saying, how could you be building |
| 1:50.4 | a summit of the Americas that traditionally has to include everyone on the continent and you |
| 1:55.0 | have invited three key countries in our continent, Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua. How can that be? And many countries |
| 2:03.0 | have simply said, if they can't be invited, why should we even honor this invitation and go to |
| 2:09.6 | Los Angeles? Some have said, why would we even send high-level delegations? And some have gone even |
| 2:15.4 | further and say, we're not going to be there at all. |
| 2:19.0 | I think we're coming to a situation where Biden's summit is already a complete flop, |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Socialist Program, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of The Socialist Program and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.