The President of the United States, Joe Biden, announced on Tuesday night that the city of Los Angeles will host the Summit of the Americas in June, a meeting that the country has not organized since its inauguration in 1994 and that will after the rudeness in the previous one by former President Donald Trump.
“The United States will host the Ninth Summit of the Americas in Los Angeles, California, in June 2022 with a focus on ‘Building a sustainable, resilient and equitable future’ in our hemisphere,” said the White House tenant through a statement.
Thus, he has argued that “the vital national interests of the United States are inextricably tied to the fortunes of America’s closest neighbors.” “To that end, the ability of our democracies to bridge the gap between what we promise and what we deliver depends in no small measure on what we do, together, to do better,” he added.
Biden has also stressed that “the Summit of the Americas is the only meeting in the hemisphere that brings together leaders from countries in North America, South America, and Central America and the Caribbean.” “America’s leadership of the summit process underscores our deep and historic commitment to the people of the Western Hemisphere and our commitment to bringing the Rebuild a Better World initiative to fruition.”
Finally, he stressed that he is working with the mayor of Los Angeles, Eric Garcetti, and the governor of California, Gavin Newsom, with the aim of “welcoming leaders and actors from across the hemisphere to advance the shared commitment to prosperity economy, security, human rights and dignity”.
The last Summit of the Americas took place in April 2018 in the capital of Peru, Lima, a meeting marked by absences. The most outstanding was that of Trump, who would have thus made his first trip to Latin America. However, he chose to send his vice president, Mike Pence.
The current US administration has shown signs in recent months of wanting to get closer to Latin America again and the Summit of the Americas will allow Biden to act as host to other leaders. These types of meetings, which are usually held every three or four years, started in 1994 with the inaugural summit in Miami.
Subsequently, these summits were held in the Chilean capital, Santiago, in 1998; in the Canadian city of Quebec, in 2001; in the Argentine city of Mar del Plata, in 2005; in the capital of Trinidad and Tobago, Port of Spain, in 2009; in the Colombian city of Cartagena, in 2012; and in the capital of Panama, Panama City, in 2015, in addition to the aforementioned summit in Lima.
