CHIQUIRINES, Guatemala—In August, Abner Lopez Macario, a 30-year-old farmer and father of two, found himself out of luck and back in Chiquirines, a town in the muggy coastal lands of Guatemala surrounded by sprawling banana plantations. Far from being a bittersweet return after years abroad, Lopez Macario’s homecoming was an admission of defeat. Three months earlier, after a 20-day trek through Mexico guided by a migrant-smuggler, he, his wife and his two sons made it all the way to the border of the United States in the back of a truck. Upon reaching El Paso, Texas, they had sought out [...]
“We signed the agreement because we want to show our friendship to our most important ally, which is the United States,” El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele, said in a meeting last week with President Donald Trump during the U.N. General Assembly. Bukele was referring to the “asylum cooperation agreement” struck the week before between his government and Washington. Though its details are still unclear, the deal would require foreign nationals who cross into El Salvador seeking asylum to apply for it there rather than in the United States. It would also give the U.S. the ability to make people with [...]
One of the most intriguing leaders to come to power in recent months is the 37-year-old, pony-tailed former ad executive who took office as president of El Salvador 100 days ago. Nayib Bukele’s election tore up the entrenched divisions that have dominated El Salvador since the end of its devastating, Cold War-era civil war. Two main political parties, acting as heirs to the conflict’s combatants, had taken their fight from the battlefield to the political arena. Bukele’s victory smashed that dynamic, but it was unclear where he stood precisely, and where his policies would lead the country. On outline is [...]
