The Robert Mueller of Latin America

Reveal

The Center for Investigative Reporting and PRX

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4.7 • 8K Ratings

🗓️ 10 April 2021

⏱️ 53 minutes

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Summary

Guatemala sends more migrants to the U.S. than anywhere in Central America. What is driving so many people to leave?

Crusading prosecutor Iván Velásquez has been called the Robert Mueller of Latin America. He’s known for jailing presidents and paramilitaries.

But Velásquez met his match when he went after Jimmy Morales, a television comedian who was elected president of Guatemala. Morales found an ally in then-U.S. President Donald Trump.

Like the alleged quid pro quo with Ukraine that prompted Trump’s impeachment, the details can seem confusing – but, ultimately, Velásquez says, both parties got what they wanted: Morales got Trump to pull U.S. support for an international anti-corruption force that was going after his family. And he says Trump secured Guatemala’s support for some of his most controversial policies, both in the Middle East and on immigration.

Veteran radio journalist Maria Martin teams up with Reveal’s Anayansi Diaz-Cortes for this week’s show. Martin takes us to Huehuetenango, a province near Guatemala’s border with Mexico that sends more migrants to the U.S. than anywhere in Central America. There, she shows that Trump’s hard-line immigration policies did nothing to slow the movement of people from Guatemala to the southern border of the U.S.

This is an update of an episode that originally aired Aug. 29, 2020.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	From the Center for Investigative Reporting in PRX, this is Reveal. I'm Al Letson.
0:09.9	President Biden recently asked Kamala Harris to take on a new assignment.
0:13.9	The United Voice President, I gave you a tough job and you're smiling, but there's no
0:20.2	better capable of trying to organize it.
0:22.7	The U.S. Mexico border.
0:23.7	Well, thank you, Mr. President, and for having the confidence in me. And there's no
0:28.6	question that this is a challenging situation. As the President has said, there are many
0:33.6	factors that lead President to leave these countries.
0:37.3	Biden promised a more humane immigration policy, but his administration has struggled to
0:42.7	handle the hundreds of Central Americans who come to the U.S. every day seeking asylum.
0:48.4	The Customs and Border Protection Facility in Donatexas, I was there, is at 1,1556 percent
0:54.4	capacity right now. There are kids that are sleeping on floors. Some of these children
0:58.4	have not seen the sun in days. Is what's happening inside acceptable to you?
1:03.7	That's a serious question, right? It's that acceptable to me. Come on. That's why we're
1:10.0	going to be moving 1,000 of those kids out quickly. That's why I got Fort Bliss opened
1:15.7	up. That's why I've been working with you.
1:17.1	Even though the pandemic has closed the border for over a year, and almost all asylum seekers
1:22.5	are expelled immediately, the U.S. government still faces the arrival of roughly 500 unaccompanied
1:29.7	miners a day. Almost half of the migrants are coming from Guatemala.
1:34.7	It must address the root causes that cause people to make the track as the President has
1:40.8	described to come here.
1:42.5	Root causes like violence and poverty plus a pandemic and two hurricanes this past year.
	...

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