We're back with another edition of the Federalist Radio Hour. I'm Emily Jaschinski,
culture editor here at the Federalist. As always, you can email the show
at radio at the Federalist dot com, follow us on X at fd R
L s T, make sure to subscribe wherever you download your podcasts, and
of course to the premium version of our website as well. We are joined
today by one Pablo Villa Smell. He is an editorial fellow at Spectator World,
also a Young Voices contributor one where can people follow you on Twitter?
My Twitter is real JP VILLI smil v I L l A s M I
L. There we go. All right, so Jp, tell us a
little bit about how you ended up as an editorial fellow at Spectator World.
Just give us a little bit of your back. I'm really excited to talk
to you about Latin American politics and some of your recent writing. But I'm
curious, you know, kind of how you ended up in this space.
Yeah. So I went to school in DC American University, and I was
really into writing. If I can go back a little further, I grew
up in Venezuela for a large portion of my life, which is why I'm
interested in Latin America naturally. So. But when I was in high school,
I met this guy and this guy told me, hey, you right,
well, do you want to pitch an article? And I pitched an
article and it failed, and then I tried again, and then I did
the solo pitching for a while throughout the end of high school and college,
and then I found out about the Intercollegiate Studies Institute by the end of college,
and they had a very nice fellowship program. So I applied and they
placed me at the Spectator World. Fantastic. So tell us a little bit
about then growing up in Venezuela with that have been so, I guess I
don't know how old do urgiv. I'm trying to figure out which dictator you
would have grown up on. Ter tell us a little bit about that,
yeah, so jokingly, people always say that growing up in Venezuela the beginning
of the twenty first century you saw more popes than presidents, because Google Chavis
was the president for most of my time there, and then I experienced the
Maduro presidency maybe for five years. I left in twenty sixteen. So yeah,
interesting, okay, great, And so you wrote I mean, obviously,
Venezuelan migration is a huge part of this current wave that we've seen coming
up to the American border, and for some I mean incredibly good reason.
Our asylum policy has, when properly applied, actually would apply to a lot
of Venezuelans who are ying Venezuela right now because asylum properly again, properly applied,
I should give entrance to people who are legitimately fleeing political repression and violence.
But that's not all of who's coming from Venezuela right now. Can you
tell us a little bit about what's happening? Yes, so a full disclosure.
I'm an American citizen, so get that out of the way. I
was born in the US, and you know my parents are American citizens too,
So I want to maybe distance myself from the other folks. I don't
know if that's politically correct, but I it doesn't matter. What has been
What has been happening, and this is the full picture, is that Venezuela
has had the poverty rates have been super high, not since last year,
since the last like twenty years. Really they were accentuated by the end of
the Chavis presidency with hyperinflation and so on, and more than ninety five percent
of the population lives under the povery line. So migration from Venezuela has been
steady since the two fourteen to twelve protests. That there was a big wave
there before that there were some people that left and searched for our new home
in other countries because they somehow predicted that things were going to get that bad.
Most people people did not. Venezuelans were worn by Cubans about the perils
of communism, but the response for Venezuelan's was always, you guys are an
island. We are in actual country. We have oil, you guys have
nothing. So the real migration wave that began in twenty fourteen was quite big,
But what we're seeing recently it's different. Primarily the mechanism which a lot
of these individuals are funding themselves into the border and the moment. The moment
is what I find really interesting, because if you were really escaping a dictatorship
alone, you would have done that ten years ago. Venezuela today it's awful.
Of course, it's not like a great country to live in, but
it's really not as bad as it was ten years ago. The worst part
of the crisis is probably twenty fourteen, twenty twelve, maybe a little later,
a little earlier, But now Venezuela finds itself and not a better place.
If I say this, I'll get killed by some Venezuelan advocates. But
if you hate the situation there now, you hate it more before, not
because things got better, just because things are not as bad. So what
really explains does migration wave. It's not economy metrics and social conditions alone.
It seems like something deeper is going on. And it's number one, the
availability you can do it, it's an option, and number two, the
networks that are now present throughout Central America and northern South America that allow for
this possibility for you to cross the southern border before that, and I'm might
to be you know specific here. The people that came to the United States
from Venezuela, and you can ask people in southern Florida about this, used
to be highly educated, not particularly high income, but comparatively so. And
they would have to buy a plane ticket, they would have to process a
visa, which is really hard to do when you live in a country like
Venezuela. So that migration profile was different than the one that we see today,
and you see, you know, this is something that you won't see
in the mainstream media, but among the own Venezuelan population in southern Florida,
they're really dissatisfied with what's happening because they look at the type of migrants that
are crossing the southern border and they say, these people are going to cause
a backlash against Venezuelans in general. And it's kind of true because most Venezuelans
are not trendy Aragua members. Most Venezulas aren't crossing the border illegally. Most
Venezulas that came to this country sought a legal way to come here. It's
fascinating and again you wrote about this for Spectator and a great piece called Behind
the Venezuelan Migrant Crime Way. Folks should go check that out. But just
a couple points that you made are so important. One is just the availability
the access to migration from Venezuela and how it's increasing migration that is such a
reflection policies, and we can get into that a little bit, but I
really wanted to ask you as you just sort of alluded to gang influence and
how perhaps shifts in gang culture and Venezuela have induced some of this as well.
What can you tell us about how that's I guess maybe shifted, maybe
grown. How would you describe it at JP? Yeah, so gang influence
in Venezuela under the Maduro regime specifically has been vast and intense. I could
talk here for hours about how there are connections between the Dez that the Sun
cartel. I guess that would be the translation in the Maduro regime. I
could talk about how the trend the Uragua basically existed because Maduro allowed it.
So I like to draw comparison to the US context for a second here.
Just imagine for a second that a gang takes control of a massive prison in
the United States and then for ten years the US government does nothing. Then
they built a sue, a nightclub, a restaurant in the prison. These
people they called them branis, which is crime bosses in Spanish, and the
government does nothing. Ten years passed by, and then out of nowhere,
they sent some troops and they seemed to be doing something, but they weren't
doing something before, or they were anything at all. So it's really complex
and what people on the ground will tell you is that basically the way the
Maduro regime operates is that they allow for some criminality to subsist, and when
it becomes a real tangible problem for the regime, it's truly when they fight
it. In the case of the trend de Irawa crime family, really they
took control of a prison in the state of Ragua called to Coron and they
spent ten years just having complete control and from the prison they used it ask
as the center of operations and they have more than they have close to three
thousand members in the gang. Now it's the biggest gang in Venezuela. And
they would they would use their influenced networks not only in Venezuela, but this
expanded to the rest of the Americas, Chile, Peru, and they would
commit crime. You know, members of the gang would commit crime, send
their funds to Tokoron or they have other you know, centers of operations in
Colombia. And that's the way they subsisted really not really like sophisticated high crime,
but stealing phones, robbing people, committing normal penny crime and using that
and the really the home that they had in Venezuela, which was really perfect
free for a crime organization to exist. So that's so that's the broad picture.
But then the Irawa operates and has operated freely because the Madud regime has
allowed it. But then the other part, the other component to this analysis,
let's say, is that there seems to be a push for these people
to leave Venezuela more recently. And I do not know necessarily if this is
an internal struggle between the criminal organization and elements of the regime or more likely,
what it seems to me like is that there has been negotiations between the
United States and Biden administration at Maduro in the last two years where Maduro has
felt increasingly comfortable weaponizing migration. So what you see Bikela do is that he'll
imprison all the criminals. But you know what's another policy that's even cheaper and
actually somehow geopolitically strategics. It's it's smart, don't imprison the criminals, kick
them out. And if you can kick them out and give them a map
that takes them to your enemy's house, then that's even better. So that
might you know, some people might hear that and think that's someone conspiranok,
And I do think, you know, it sounds like a conspiracy, but
that's the theory that a lot of Venezuelan's underground and Latin American analysts are.
That's their conclusion. Well, and there's some there is some evidence, right
that prisons have been depleted in Venezuela. Yeah, this has happened in the
past, this one in particular, which is I would say it's the most
like preoccupying one because it's it's not just a normal prison, it's a a
person where the influence network is stronger than probably any other person in the Americas
really because it was controlled by the gang and they have they had their allies,
and they've been operating for a while, so they have some some cohesion
that you might not see in another disorganized person with a bunch of different folks.
So yes, I and the other another thing to think about is that
the barbado courts, which are these paths to democracy, negotiations have been going
on, which, by the way, completely unfruitful. Maduro has responded to
that, to the relieving of sanctions from from the Biden regime, to the
sending back of the so called diplomat alex ab back to Venezuela, and they
released some US prisoners, although that was not enough in compared to what they
gave. When all these things have been happening, were the Biden dream has
been showing some good faith a lah Iran really similar. Actually what Madua has
been doing has he's been punching back. So Biden extends his hand and says,
hey, we're going to release your nephews from prison. We're going to
release alex ab the highest level of Venezona official we've ever captured. We're going
to release all these folks. We're going to relieve some sanctions. And Maduro
has looked at that and said, okay, do it, Thank you very
much, awesome, and then he said, okay, if you want to
put them back, put them back. We're not going to move toward a
democracy. What we're going to do is that we're not going to let you
the poor, the illegal immigrants, and we're going to send them there and
we're gonna cost some chaos in the United States indirectly. So they've been really
successful. I think Maduro has olex smarted the Biden administration and this should be
national news. This is incredibly interesting. Number one, but also somewhat scary
how a nation like Venezuela is managing to push Biden toward being soft on them.
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other places. I mean Haiti is one example. The former US ambassadord to
Haiti has said that the United States backs Aril on Ree, who was seen
as a legitimate was stepped into the role after the former president of Haiti,
Joven Al Moyes, was assassinated and the Biden The former US abassadord to Haiti
says that the Biden administration backs ariol on Rie with the specific sort of agreement
that he accepts flights of people Haitians who have not lived in Haiti, you
know, in many cases since the twenty twelve earthquake, back to Haiti,
back to Portaw Prince. And so it's like these situations are you know,
obviously just bargaining chips on the Biden administration's chess board, and the Biden administration
is not winning at this And maybe JPU could talk to us a little bit
about the tie you just mentioned, the ties between Iran and Venezuela, which
are deeper than I think. Again, oh, the American media talks about
it. I don't think people are necessarily aware of what Iran has done physically
in Venezuela, and that's certainly a huge piece of this puzzle. Yeah.
So in when it comes to this, there's a particular scholar. His name
is Joseph Humeyer, which I would suggest to your listeners if you're interesting about
learning about how present Iran is in America's backyard. He's the guy and from
what I've learned by you know, I know him and talking to him and
going to his events with the Center for Secure Free society is that has belaw
presses Iranian presence, and really, you know, people talk about the Russo,
the Russian, China, Allians, and sometimes in some specific regions of
the world they're more aligned than others, but in Latin America's specifically, they're
quite aligned. And the Russia is the Chinese and Theiranians in Venezuela specifically,
for example, have had so much influence. Actually, and this is a
fun fact, the largest military pressence that Russia has in the Americas since the
Cuban Missile crisis, and larger than the Cuban missile crisis, it's in an
island in Venezuela La Chila. So what we fixate on the Middle East understandably,
so when we look at China, which it's obviously a you know,
we need to focus on China because it's a big country and they're biggest year,
the political competitor, and Asia has more defense on and you know,
we have some ice in Europe as well, but our eyes in Latin America
are nowhere to be found. And this is really worrisome because you know,
who has their eyes on Latin America, who has their eyes on Venezuela,
on So in all these countries, it's on China, Russia, their debt
set on controlling influencing politics there more than the United States is. And then
in Dallace presents a threat to the US. So a lot of these,
a lot of the of the migration crises that we observe, a lot of
the the way these actors just interact with the United States and the international sphere
are more coordinated than we think. I really think that it's really China calling
the pride out. Actually China, Chinese ambassador goes to Venezuela than when all
the when all the world leaders were meeting for the G twenty summit, Shi
Jimping welcome Maduro to Beijing, shook cancer him there and he's really prioritizing his
connections to Latin America. And you see him Riscilla as well, And you
see all these like isolated events, and you have to ask yourself what's happening
behind the curtain. And I think it's that these competitors that we have far
away are pushing their friends in the Western hemisphere towards specific direction. And I
don't know if the United States, of course they're noticing, but they don't
seem to care. Our elites don't care. You know. I talked to
a pastor that sort of been twenty I think this was twenty twenty one,
who runs a shelter in Mexico, and he was saying that he's first started
noticing sort of uncontrollable flows of migration. Yeah, there have been different waves
in different periods of American history, but he's first started noticing the current macro
wave when the Obama administration changed the Cuba policy so that it's not just if
you are fleeing Cuba and you touch American soil, you immediately get asylum.
But what he said is that drove people to start flying maybe from Cuba to
Venezuela, maybe from Cuba to Nicaragua, and making their way up through Latin
America, through Central America into Mexico and then to the border to find a
new pathway to sort of get into the United States because the old way of
just sort of taking you know, raft touching ground in Florida was not the
most effective way to get citizenship. But he said that really created these super
highways, these pathways, and he'd put that, you know, sometime in
the Obama administration twenty twelve, twenty thirteen somewhere around there, and ever since,
it's just grown. Cartel power in all of these different countries has grown.
And that's obviously what Boukell is a reaction to. That's what a lot
of these countries are reacting to. It's hurt economies, it's obviously hurt people.
It seems like actually migration itself has been one of the biggest destabilizing factors,
whether it's Venezuela or other countries throughout all of this. No, yeah,
and I think that's a Then that's an interesting timeframe to start looking at
at the at the changes. I don't know if I would attribute it directly
to the Cuba policy, but what I would say is that it is important
to look at Latin America, you know, look at every individual country and
their you know, specific circumstances that they face, but also the the interconnections
there, because no, no continent and I mean no, no left wing
regional movement is interconnected as Latin America's uh Brazil, for instance, the Lula
the Silva regime has used state funds to invest in Venezulan infrastructure projects, and
similarly, when Chavis was president, He used this mechanism called Petu diplomacy to
use oil to finance not only infrastructure of projects, but protest movements and electoral
can page throughout the continent. And this is again it's really easy to observe
these connections when it comes to the politics of it all, that's supporting a
candidate that enabling a protest. But you definitely see this in the enactment of
policy. So if let's say you're Maduro right, and the first left wing
president just got elected in Colombia and he goes to Mita Flotus, which is
the Venezulan equivalent of the White House, and they shake hands and they're having
an immigration issue. Right, Colombia has been facing that the immigration crisis in
regards to Venezuela more than any other country, because you know, they're the
neighbors. What can they agree on, what what can they do to minimize
this problem for Colombia but at the same time minimize this problem for Venezuela.
So an ec antidote to that chaos would be, Hey, Gustavo Petro,
I'm gonna do it. By the way, why don't you just allow for
this immigrants to cross through your country and head toward the United States. And
what does Gustavo Petra say, Okay, I'll do that. And I'm sure
that that same interaction would be happening between other presidents throughout the region, possibly
Amblo. These presidents interact with each other, they know each other. They
have more control over migration policy than the United States does. Oh, the
president does have a lot, but he doesn't use it. And I think
that the more you look into it, the more it seems like these precedents,
these leaders are using migration as a diplomatic tool. Yeah, that's a
great point. And maybe you could also just talk to us a little bit
about what it's like for the average Venezuelan living in Venezuela right now. You
know, there are reasons that people would want to leave Venezuela that don't just
involve, you know, leaving prisons. What's it you know, under under
Medora right now? What is it like in Venezuela. Yeah, I've I've
written extensively about this. Actually visited Venezuela for the first time in about six
years last December and it was quite fun. I felt like this might be
a nerdy reference, kind of felt like less is a Togueville. When he
would write, he would write about the United States as as a non American.
After not spending a bunch of time in Venezuela and I headed back,
I was able to observe a lot of cultural changes that were interesting. Something
that people don't talk about a lot in Venezuela is that economic conditions have at
least superficially improved. And this is not to say that a poverty is not
a problem. It is, but at least in the in the capitol Kracas,
you see a lot of modernization. You see restaurants, you see new
buildings, you see designer stores popping popping here and there, so and you
actually have seen crime drop. I remember reading, you know, on Twitter,
when the Venezuela on migrant attacks were on the rice and everyone was talking
about hoose Ebarra and v Mendosa, the assaulting of a minor and the killing
of Lakeln Riley. People started to spot that the crime rates and crocats have
actually dropped. And this is not to you know, again, like Madua's
awful guy. It's not to say that his policies have been successful, but
it's it's mainly a reaction to some of that, let's say, getting used
to misery. It's a really bad way to put it. Getting used to
how bad things have gotten. Yeah. Yeah, people have learned in a
way to just accept it, which is really sad. The hopes of political
change in Venezuela are really low. There's a new candidate there, Madiquitina Matchel,
which is really popular. But if you ask the old Lenislona do you
think anything's going to change? They know. And you also see, and
not to get to philosophical here, you see how the the new elites and
the old elites have you know, they've settled it out, and some of
them are comfortable. So for instance, when when I was growing up in
Venezuela, you would see, for instance, let's say that I hate to
talk in this way, but you would see like then the mover reach,
right, which was government connected individuals not highly educated, but they know someone
who knows someone, and then they got to power and they replaced the old
elites. Right. You would see the old elites were really resentful and if
you were an old elite family, you didn't hang out with the new elites.
You thought they were dirty, They were connected to the worst people in
the world to the narcos. You don't like them. What you've seen in
Venezuela now is that a lot of the new elites and the old elites have
become friends and now they're parts of the same circles. So that, in
my opinion, really deteriorates any chances of political change. And meanwhile, the
most tangible conditions in the life of the average fenessula, which again are your
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So surf shark dot deals slash Federalist in Latin America is reacting to this and
sort of predictably to similar conditions, or I mean, nothing is quite Venezuela
at this point, but reacting and sort of typically polarized ways where there's there
was talk of, you know, kind of a pink wave because far left
candidates were elected, so very clearly far left candidates were elected in the last
couple of years. But then also you have me Lea and you have Bukel,
and Bukeli is extremely popular. So JP that's kind of in and of
itself very interesting as you look around Latin America, bou Kele is popular,
like outside of his own country, he's popular. There's you know, people
really admire what he's done. At the same time, you know, there
is still interest in the sort of far left historically and today in Latin America.
So do you see more kind of Melee and Bukell are very different figures,
obviously, but both kind of culturally reactionary, do you I don't mean
that in a pejorative sense. How do you see all of this playing out
down the road? Yeah? So I like that you're familiar with the difference.
Is because one thing that I thought was really funny, and I'm sure
you did as well, was that when when Malay won, a lot of
people reacted as if it where a Trump style populist, and you know,
you saw a lot of folks on the New right, uh, celebrate his
him in a way that seemed, you know, a little not cognizant of
who he is. And this is not to say that he's not the right
antio for Argentina, because Argentina is not the US. Uh. Their their
common enemy is hyperinflation and their government is quite huge, so maybe they do
need a libertarian uh. But anyways, I digress. What I will say
is that I do think that's really interesting that the Bookilly model and the Malay
model are both really distinct. Uh. Book is the most let's say that,
the closest thing to a national nationalist traditional conservative that we have in Latin
America. Because the thing is that the word conservative in Latin America has actually
not has lost some popularity. A lot of opposition figures don't call themselves conservatives.
I don't really know why, because it's you know, overwhelming Catholic continent.
But maybe this has to do something with conversations on the top and not
necessarily popular sentiment. But at least in Venezuela, we really haven't observed any
conservative reaction. Actually, Maria Kurina Machado, which is the opposition figure there,
she labels herself a classical liberal. She's more Malay than Bukela, although
I could see a Bukela like figure become really popular in Venezuela. And she
talks about privatizing elements of the public sphere of the old companies and so on.
And in Colombia you see that similarly. Duque and Maria fernand which is
a Columbian center there, I would say, has introduced some Bookilla like discourse
into her her platform, although she's not officially running for president yet, but
she will. She she talks about being strong on crime and so on,
but at the core, she's more Hayak than she is Burke. And I
think most South American figures remain closer to the let's say, the the pre
Trump conservative tradition than the new one. It's interesting to see, if it
would be interesting to see how Bookeilla influences this. I think that the Bukella
lovers have some hope because something that happened at Sea Pack, which I attended,
and I and I went to some of the events that happened behind the
scenes with the Latin American leaders. But Tresa Bullrich, who's the Minister of
Security in Argentina, who actually ran against Malay from the center right, she
actually approached Bukele and said that she has that Argentina has a lot to learn
from their model and that they want to, you know, learn their lessons
and maybe apply the model themselves and being harsh on crime. And then in
Ecuador Noboa, who's he's also quite you know, pre Trump gop like doesn't
really talk about a lot of the things that the animates the American Conservative movement.
He talks about what animated it twenty years ago. He has also talked
about building massive prisons. Actually, some of the chaos that ensued in door
I thing a month ago or two months ago, happened right after he announced
that he was building a megaprison a la Bukele. So Bukele is having some
influence. But I still think that the predominant model of governance when it comes
to to the right in Latin America, it is a a traditional low taxes.
We don't dive into some of the social issues. Our priority is economic
and that makes some sense in Latin America because it's the most unequal continent in
the world, and economics is center, is front and center if any political
platform there. So I think that's what has you know, some of the
discourse on culture and social issues and more broadly has not been front and center.
And I think Boukeley is the exception to the rule, but maybe he
will become more than that. I think he is. That's fascinating. Is
there anything else, Jip, You think people maybe that we didn't touch on
that, You think people in America should know either about Venezuela or about the
situation in Latin America in general. In general. Yeah, what I would
tell people is that they should be aware of the in Washington, d C.
The lack of interest that there is when it comes to Latin America in
the last years, and this is especially noticeable on the right. There's been
a let's say, a lack of passion for Latin America. People think of
Latin America and they say, oh, these are communists, they hate us,
there are drug lords, and we can't really do anything because when we
try to do something, the Pink Tide happened. And you know, this
defeatism has taken over over the right in the North and has really influenced the
successes of the right in the South. And what I will tell people is
that that's not number one, that's not the intelligent position. I would say,
if the left takes over, you don't give up right if you're a
conservative right and when you look at some of them, I'm not going to
trash any particular think tanks because maybe one day I want a job. But
I've been to something thinks. I've been to some thing tanks, right,
and I've talked to some of the of the figures in the thinkings, some
of the leaders, and I've asked them, hey, like do you have
a lot of America person and some major thing tanks in the United States have
let's say five people working on the Middle East. Now they have like twenty
working an age, and they have some working in Europe because all the euro
a lot of the European Alliance in the United States is so important because twenty
five percent of this and the GDP and whatever or oh. But then when
it comes to Latin America, you have no one. Some thing things will
have like a twenty year old writing some you know, Latin America articles and
that's it. Others have like literally no one, uh seeking to learn about
Latin America. There's really not a lot of think tanks, not a lot
of researchers that are passionate about Latin America's actually talking to one of my friends.
His name is Carlos Schrua. Uh. He used to be he used
to work for the national interest and he was telling me that. He was
like, JP, you're one of the only you know, conservative people that
I know that actually writes about Latin America and not from a from a how
do I see it? This is as a democracy, social media and perspective,
And I thought, you know, I took that as a compliment,
but aside from that, I also said, Wow, that's really worrying because
we should have people writing about Latin America and kind of describing the real,
tangible national interest that are in our backyard. It's not just oh, we
love them because because we share content with them and we want to spread democracy
and good values. Is that they have a lot of critical minerals lithium,
coltan, and o. These they're going to be so important in the next
industrial revolution. They have their agricultural potential, it's immense. They have so
many things that we should be trying to exploit for our concrete national interests.
And while we're at it, it's good to have, you know, people
that like us close to us. And if we hyper focus on the rest
of the world, on Asia specifically, some of the Elbrich Kobe fans might
get mad with me here, Well, we're we're Elbert Kobe fans on this
podcast say it though, JP he can handle it. Yeah, Like I
really like what Kobe and I think he's he's actually like completely right. When
it comes to like the broad picture, Asian matters more the But if you
say that right, I would probably say Asian matters number one, and actually
Latin America matters number two. Europe of course matters, and you know what,
always it will always matter because if we have that Western inheritance and that
share culture. But when it comes to concrete national security, Latin America matters
more because the day that let's say, China invades Taiwan or something else happens
in that part of the world, if the United States reacts, what do
we think is gonna happen in the Western Hemisphere. Why do you think the
Chinese and the Russians have invested so heavily in Venezuela just because of the oil,
No, not really, it's the military aspect of it too. They're
building massive bases in all these countries. It's not just the spy facility in
Cuba. It's much more than that. It's Venezuela is much bigger than Cuba,
and they have. They have hundreds of islands actually in the Caribbean,
small islands and other formations. Some of them we already know have military presences
and those are expanding. And actually what I've referenced this before, but when
all the world leaders, you know, the Western world were meaning at the
G twenty summit, who does she jmping me with? He met with Maduro
and actually that day they announced the Maduro and I forgot the label that he
used, but he rose the relationship between Venezuela and China rose to a level
in which now Venezuela is the closest ally diplomatically speaking to China in the Western
hemisphere. Let's say I forgot the name that they use, but let's say
they're like gold level allies now and they were silver level allies before. So
when the world was meeting to talk about world problems, Chi Jimping was meeting
with Maduro and letting the world know that now they're best butts more than ever
before. And then he went to Cuba and he gave a speech in Cuba,
and this was the I think it was the G eighty something plus China.
He gave a speech there. Not she one of his ambassadors gave a
speech there talking about how the global style house to unite to counter American hegemony,
and then leaders from Colombia, Chile, Venezuela all gave same ve of
the speech. So for for the for the Americans that love to think about
geopolitics and how this affects them concretely and not just ah democracy, I would
tell you what's going on in Latin America has the potential to become an actual
national security threat. Quality toward Latin America, of course affects immigration, but
that's you know, that's more indirect. And number two and this is,
you know, the easiest way to look at it. When your enemies or
your competitors are focused on becoming friends with people near your neighborhood, maybe you
should worry. You should worry much more. And I think we're worrying a
little bit more now, But I don't think we're worrying enough. So go,
I don't know, Go call your congresman and tell them to do something
about Latin America. How much do you spend from your paycheck? In about
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you get your podcast. I mean, I think there's a very good argument
it's the most important given what's been happening at the border, as you've written
about JP, that it's even more important than Asia because once again, this
is happening every single day to the tunes of tens of thousands of people,
so the tune of millions of people over the course of years, and that
destabilizes not just the country immediately to the south of US, but all of
the countries to the south of that. It has increased drug trafficking, it
has created just widespread and stability, and as you started off by saying,
our policies are are not blameless in all of that. So I don't think
it's crazy at all to suggest that Latin America is right up there with ASHAFT,
but even more important given the sort of immediate concerns happening every single day
at the border. Yeah, but like what I was. The reason why
why I say I say this is because I think that a lot of people
in the America first sphere for inst is and I understand it. There's a
lot of people that in the United States talk about Latin America. You know,
my name is Swan, So I feel like a lot of people would
like think that, oh, this guy is here to advocate for invading Venezuela.
I actually know, I don't think that's like a really depends on the
circumstance, but it's not like a smart thing to do. Now. There's
not a lot of people that know about Latin America and actually care deeply about
the United States, and we need more of those. And hey, guys,
I think I want to be able to say, but uh, I
think there's a growing movement uh in the and within you know Latin America specialists.
Uh that are they grew up in the United States, they studied here,
and they really appreciate the American tradition and the way of life, and
they want to make policy to advance American interests and not Colombian, Cuban or
Venezulan interest So a lot of the the people with Venezuela experience, for example,
if they were in this podcast, they would be talking about how M.
Duris awful and about how like socialism destroy their country and advocating for some
sort of regime change. That's not what I'm going to do, and that's
not what people should be doing. And just because some people are doing that
doesn't mean that every single argument made about why we should care about Latin America
are you know, are dumb and should be ignored, which I think is
the response from lots of folks. I mean, yeah, that's a great
point. Iran is like actually farming in Venezuela. Venezuela Maduro offered some like
one according to Iran, at least a million hectares of land for farming and
military development. I'm sure is happening as well. So, JP, this
has been so interesting. I just appreciate your perspective so much. Thank you
very much for having me. This is really fun, and you know a
lot, you know a lot about Latin America. So you know, it's
it is. I am completely on your side that Latin America is arguably the
most important. I mean, it's astounding to me how much we have ignored
the vast destabilization that's happened over the course of the last you know, ten
plus years. Obviously it's a much longer story than that, but the waves
of vast sUAS, of Latin America actually being under the control of extremely powerful
gangs. It's just astounding how little we talk about it. So I think
you're totally right on that front. Well, thank you very much and keep
doing what you do. I love it, appreciate it. Remind us where
people can follow you on Twitter JP. Yeah, you can find me add
real JP vellismell v I L L as M I L. And he's also,
of course an editorial fellow at Spectator World and a Young Voices contributor.
I'm Emily Trshinsky, culture editor here at the Federalists. We'll be back soon
with more. Until then, he lovers of freedom and anxious for the fray