Brazil’s surprise inflation slowdown hands Lula friendlier tailwinds ahead of October’s tight election as Peru’s Fujimori bets new AI surveillance & prison reform can finally make a military security model work
Bolivia embracing U.S. anti-crime cooperation after 20 years apart, a record cocaine bust turning into an unresolved US-Bolivia-Chile dispute, and Brazil drawing a firm line against any U.S. military action on its soil
Colombia’s incoming president rewrites foreign policy before taking office, Peru completes a historic transfer of power in Lima & Venezuela yet to offer an election date
Machado’s public break with U.S.-backed Venezuela transition, Brazil & Argentina’s diplomatic rupture ahead of Brazil’s tight election, and Díaz-Canel’s “genocide” comparison amid Cuba’s blackouts
Cuban dissident artist Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara arrived in exile in Miami after five years in prison as new census data reveals Miami as the only major Hispanic metro where Spanish retention is rising rather than fading
Peru’s economy is expanding on record gold & copper prices, even as an extortion crisis threatens law & order. In Puerto Rico, a wave of migrant interdictions this month reflects a quieter economic story
Nicolás Maduro’s federal narco-terrorism trial now set for June 2027 — a case proceeding as Washington warms ties with Venezuela. Meanwhile, in Colombia’s Catatumbo region, renewed fighting between ELN & FARC dissidents has confined residents & displaced thousands more
In Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega declares the country will never hold elections again. In Mexico, a new State Department report revives uncomfortable questions about Russian intelligence agents in Mexico, and a new security alliance between Bogotá & Washington
In Buenos Aires, fans clashed with riot police after Argentina’s extra-time World Cup final loss as new State Department report targets Cuba and Venezuela’s political transition begins to take place
Miami-Dade County government steps into foreign-policy territory on behalf of its Venezuelan community. Tax Collector Dariel Fernandez has led both efforts: a countywide donation drive to Venezuela & a crackdown in revoking business licenses tied to unauthorized commerce with Cuba
U.S. finalize 25% tariff on Brazil over deforestation & trade practices. In Peru, a renewed state of emergency in five Pisco districts, and in Venezuela, an unapproved U.S. plan to send 3,000 civilian technicians & $3 billion to administer post-earthquake reconstruction
Two stories this week capture the uneven state of the U.S.-led fight against Latin American drug trafficking. Nine arrests in a Chiapas massacre and San Diego narcoterrorism indictment, while at sea, the U.S. military’s boat-strike campaign has gone quiet for the first time in nearly a year