From Newsgroup: alt.law-enforcement

https://apnews.com/article/latin-america-crime-immigration-backlash-politics-a4c4534f11ba474c9df3ba5ca492b4b1

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) rCo At the start of this decade, Latin America was hurtling to the left. Progressives, seizing on public outrage over
entrenched inequities exacerbated by the pandemic, swept to power in
many of the regionrCOs biggest economies, including Brazil, Chile,
Colombia and Peru.

A political backlash is brewing, though. Although homicide rates have
broadly declined across Latin America compared to a decade ago, spikes
in some countries and a regionwide rise in other crimes, particularly extortion, have created the conditions for conservative populists to
score votes by promising strong-arm tactics against crime and immigration.

Stump speeches casting migrants as criminals and pitching heavy-handed security strategies popularized by El SalvadorrCOs president, Nayib
Bukele, have won conservative candidates U.S. President Donald TrumprCOs backing and fired up their disaffected electorates despite concerns that
such tactics could encourage human rights abuses or threaten democracy.

rCLYou have an emergent right wing that is very much in collaboration
across the region and with the U.S. through the MAGA movement, which has
also used crime as a rallying cry for political mobilization,rCY said
Enrique Roig, vice president of the nonprofit Human Rights First and a
former State Department official. rCLItrCOs easier to sell locking people up than it is to deal with the reasons why mainly young men join gangs in countries like El Salvador.rCY

Tough-on-crime platforms swing votes
Although populist politics across the political spectrum have done well,
only the right has offered short-term security solutions that will make
voters rCLfeel safer in six monthsrCY even if they have to rCLsacrifice democracy and human rights,rCY said Adam Isacson, director for defense oversight at the Washington Office on Latin America organization.

Proposals offered by the left, such as community violence prevention
programs, better police training, and judicial and prison reforms, take
more time to bear fruit, he said.

rCLItrCOs absolutely what yourCOre supposed to be doing, but peoplerCOs patience
runs out,rCY Isacson said of long-term proposals. rCLSo, there come the Bukeles of the world saying, rCyYou want to feel better? We got this.rCOrCY

In Colombia, where swaths of the countryside have fallen into renewed conflict, pro-Trump businessman Abelardo de la Espriella has topped
polls ahead of SundayrCOs runoff election as he takes his cues from Bukele.

In Peru, where extortion has increased fivefold in the past five years,
Keiko Fujimori rocketed to a June 7 presidential runoff on a
law-and-order platform, vowing to deploy the military in prisons and
along borders as she leans on the authoritarian legacy of her disgraced
late father, former President Alberto Fujimori.

Costa Ricans, rattled by record levels of drug-related killings, elected conservative populist Laura Fern|indez in February for her tough-on-crime platform. Honduran businessman Nasry Asfura swept DecemberrCOs election
after Trump endorsed him as a partner in the fight against rCLnarco-communists.rCY

Organized crime expands, fueling more violence
Latin America and the Caribbean last year saw their combined average
homicide rate drop by more than 5% compared to 2024, with the median
rate reaching about 17.6 per 100,000 people, according to InSight Crime,
a think tank focused on organized crime in the Americas.

But there are a few key exceptions. Drug-fueled killings have increased
in Peru and Colombia, the worldrCOs top cocaine producers, as well as in neighboring Ecuador, whose major ports traffickers see as a gateway to European markets.

Last year, authorities tallied 2,400 homicides in Peru and 14,780 in
Colombia, which were the most in each country since at least 2020.
Killings rose a remarkable 31% in Ecuador year-on-year, to 9,216.

Gangs are blamed for much of the violence that began soaring in Ecuador
during the COVID-19 pandemic, as cartels from Mexico, Colombia and the
Balkans expanded their operations and hired locals, who set off a deadly
fight over drug-trafficking routes. Their territorial disputes include prisons, where hundreds of inmates have been killed since 2021.

Ecuadorian authorities also recorded more than 16,100 cases of extortion
last year, which was down from 23,000 in 2024, though experts say itrCOs
an underreported crime.

Populists seize an opportunity
Four years ago, Chilean voters rejected ultra-conservative lawmaker Jos|- Antonio Kast in favor of ex-President Gabriel Boric, a young, tattooed
former student protest leader seeking to address ChilerCOs endemic social inequities. Last year, though, fears over rising crime rCo and its
frequent association in media with the countryrCOs growing population of Venezuelan immigrants rCo played into KastrCOs hands, returning him to power.

As Venezuelan crime syndicates like the Tren de Aragua gang seized on
their countryrCOs mass migration wave to infiltrate human trafficking
networks following the pandemic, Chile, long one of Latin AmericarCOs
safest countries, witnessed an unprecedented explosion of carjackings, kidnappings and shoot-outs.

ChilerCOs homicide rate rose by 30%, to a peak of 6.7 per 100,000 people
from 2021 to 2022, according to the Interior Ministry. It has since
dropped but has stayed above pre-2021 levels. Other types of violent
crime are still rising, including kidnappings, which have increased by
nearly 180% over the past four years.

Drawing inspiration from Bukele, whose mega-prisons in El Salvador he
toured while campaigning, Kast handily beat his Communist opponent in
December with pledges to build a massive border wall, toughen prison conditions for gang members and deport hundreds of thousands of migrants without legal status. For his promises of safety, voters shrugged off
KastrCOs opposition to abortion and same-sex marriage rights and his
defense of Augusto PinochetrCOs bloody dictatorship.

In Peru, despite the contentious legacy of the convicted Alberto
Fujimori, his daughterrCOs candidacy has taken advantage of a surge in
violent crime four years after she lost the election to schoolteacher
Pedro Castillo.

Campaigning under the slogan rCLPeru with Order,rCY Keiko Fujimori won the largest vote share in AprilrCOs first round of voting. Results of the June
7 runoff still show her in a technical tie with the political heir of
the imprisoned Castillo, nationalist Roberto S|inchez.

Experts say the publicrCOs appetite for tough tactics rCo historically associated with the regionrCOs right-wing 20th-century dictatorships rCo has grown alongside its shrinking confidence in state institutions and its deepening ambivalence about democracy.

rCLThe thinking is often, rCydemocracy hasnrCOt been able to keep me and my family safe, so maybe democracy is part of the problem,rCOrCY said Eduardo Moncada, director of the Institute of Latin American Studies at Columbia University.

That poses a major challenge to the Latin American left, which in many countries has presided over sluggish economies, grappled with corruption scandals and failed to fulfill promises of social reform in recent years.

Even progressives such as Jeannette Jara in Chile and S|inchez in Peru
have shifted with the political tide. UruguayrCOs president, Yamand|| Orsi, called BukelerCOs model an example worthy of further study. The
center-left Guatemalan government declared a state of emergency to crack
down on gang violence this year and welcomed the Trump administrationrCOs
help targeting drug traffickers.

Campaign promises meet reality
Recently elected politiciansrCO hard-line ambitions, though, have collided with the practicalities of governing complex and cash-strapped
democracies like Ecuador and Chile. They are nothing like tiny El
Salvador, where BukelerCOs party holds a legislative supermajority.

Ecuadorian President Daniel NoboarCOs promises in his 2023 campaign
included locking up gang leaders on barges and building mega-prisons. He abandoned the floating prisons proposal after taking office, and it took
his government until November to open the first mega-prison.

rCLBuilding mega-prisons hasnrCOt been that easy or that straightforward because the country is in a very bad state financially and because
President Daniel Noboa still sees himself as a democrat,rCY said Beatriz Garc|!a Nice, policy analyst for the Washington-based Stimson Center
think tank.

Nearly three months into KastrCOs tenure, pollsters say a skeptical public canrCOt tell the difference between his security crackdown and that of his left-wing predecessor. His government has organized only two deportation flights after promising to immediately round up and expel ChilerCOs more
than 300,000 immigrants without legal status. A different, more sheepish
tone has crept into his speeches. Last month, he came under fire for
calling the mass deportation promise rCLa metaphor.rCY

Even as he pitched new security measures in a June 1 address, including banning those convicted of attacking police from receiving social
benefits, he tried to whittle down his supportersrCO outsize expectations.

rCLGoverning, as many of you know, means taking responsibility for
reality, especially when itrCOs difficult,rCY he said. rCLIrCOm proceeding step
by step because this isnrCOt something that happens overnight.rCY

___

DeBre reported from Buenos Aires, Argentina.

https://apnews.com/article/latin-america-crime-immigration-backlash-politics-a4c4534f11ba474c9df3ba5ca492b4b1
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