As expected, the Movimiento Regeneración Nacional or MORENA, the party created by Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (known as AMLO), did rather well in Mexico’s regional elections on June 2, 2019. Anticipated as the first test of his popularity since taking office in December 2018, AMLO’s party grabbed both governorships on offer, in Puebla

Nicaragua’s opposition called a 24-hour general strike on May 23, 2019, in the hopes of ratcheting up pressure on the government of President Daniel Ortega and forcing him to release political prisoners. The strike had broad support among many businesses, and emptied streets in most of Nicaragua’s cities. The opposition also attempted to carry out demonstrations

On May 18, 2019, Senator and former President of Argentina Cristina Fernández de Kirchner (known as CFK), announced that she has decided to name her former chief of staff, Alberto Fernández, as the presidential candidate for her branch of Peronismo, while she will become his vice-presidential candidate. At almost the same moment, Bolivian President Evo

On April 30, 2019, Juan Guaidó, president of the Venezuelan Asamblea Nacional or AN, called for a military uprising against the government of President Nicolás Maduro. Guaidó insisted that the move was the “beginning of the end” for Maduro’s regime, and that there was “no turning back.” In the days that followed, the effort quickly

On April 27, 2019, Former Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva gave his first interview since going to prison in April 2018, in which he bemoaned the travesty that a “band of malucos” (“madmen”) is governing his country. Lula was convicted on corruption charges that his supporters, in Brazil and around the world, say

On April 17, 2019, Alan Gabriel Ludwig García Pérez, who served in Peru’s congress and was twice president, from 1985 to 1990 and from 2006 to 2011, shot himself in the head when police attempted to arrest him at his home in Lima for alleged links to the Odebrecht corruption case. He was sixty-nine years

On April 11, 2019, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was arrested in the United Kingdom, and hauled out of the Ecuadorian embassy in London after the government of President Len­ín Moreno revoked his seven-year asylum. The action possibly cleared a path for his extradition to the United States. Viewers around the world watched video of a

The blackouts that began in early March 2019 continued to plague Venezuela in early April, strangling its already faltering oil production, generating more water shortages, and sending people back into the streets in protest. Self-proclaimed “Interim President” Juan Guaidó, president of the Asamblea Nacional, continued to call for an end to the government of President

In late March and the first days of April, 2019, Venezuela continued to be plagued by an electricity crisis that had completely paralyzed work and school activities for at least ten days. The fluctuation of power also affected the supply of drinking water throughout the country, while telephone services and internet access suffered the consequences

On March 21, 2019, former Brazilian President Michel Temer was arrested for suspicion of corruption in the massive criminal investigation known as the Lava Jato, or “Operation Car Wash,” probe. The huge and ongoing effort began as an investigation into kickbacks to politicians and public officials. Since launching in March 2014, Operação Lava Jato has led