Rubio warns Senate that inviting dictators to Summit of the Americas offers autocrats political 'credibility'

As the Biden administration prepares to host the Ninth Annual Summit of the Americas next month, Republican Sen. Marco Rubio addressed the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on Western Hemisphere to warn that allowing the region’s dictatorships to participate would give them unwarranted “credibility.”

“There's credibility attached to being invited to these forums. There's credibility that's damaging, by the way, to those who oppose them, to people that have risked their lives, risked their fortunes, risked their futures, risked everything to stand up to these people and are being told, well, those are the leaders of that country, and we have to deal with them,” Rubio charged.

Last month, the State Department announced that the Cuban, Nicaraguan and Venezuelan regimes will likely be excluded from the Summit of the Americas – a regional summit set to be held in Los Angeles in June.

Speaking to a small group of reporters, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Brian Nichols said “they are unlikely to be there,” adding that the summit was open to the Western Hemisphere’s democracies.

Shortly after the announcement was made, however, leftist leaders from across the region – including Mexico, Bolivia and Brazil -- began urging Washington to allow all of the region’s delegations to participate, threatening to boycott the summit if their demands weren’t met.

In order to avoid an international embarrassment -- which could show the waning influence the U.S. now wields in the region -- the U.S. has in recent days begun flirting with the region’s leaders, sending a delegation to Mexico City to meet with leftist President López Obrador and moving towards lifting some sanctions against the Cuban and Venezuelan regimes.   

Such moves have left Republican lawmakers and analysts worried about how far the administration is willing to go in order to appease the opposition and hold a successful summit.

Speaking to the Senate subcommittee, Rubio warned that the “post-Cold War hubris about democracy is being directly challenged” in the region by democratically elected leaders who “don’t govern as democrats” and “use the power they acquire electorally to undermine the functioning of institutions.”

“That's been the case in a number of places,” he said. “Nicaragua is one, Venezuela is another. And so you have the real challenge today, not just of a long-term dictatorship that's been in Cuba for a very long time, but what basically are now dictatorships in Venezuela, in Nicaragua, and the fear that that could spread to other places.”

The Florida Senator further charged his fellow senators with ignoring the political situation in the region, sending a message that the U.S. “just doesn’t care.”

“I think that's reflected in a number of places, including, frankly, with all due respect, here in the United States Senate, where a handful of us do care a lot about what happens in the region, but others just don't spend a lot of time on it. I understand the world is a busy place … but in the framework of public policy, the Western Hemisphere is neglected given its importance both strategically and geographically to what's happening in the United States,” he charged.

Allowing dictators to go unchecked has serious geopolitical consequences for the region, however, and ultimately gives undemocratic regimes political legitimacy, Rubio warned.  

In a recent ADN America opinion piece, Rubio warned that “making concessions to authoritarians in our hemisphere only empowers dictators worldwide.”

“The regimes in both Cuba and Venezuela have been staunch defenders of Vladimir Putin and his invasion of Ukraine. If the White House cozies up to them, we may see more countries in our own region turn a blind eye to Putin’s invasion,” he said.

“At a moment when anti-American influence is expanding internationally and making inroads into Latin America, we should use diplomatic efforts, increase internet access, and expand democracy promotion to prevent such an outcome,” he added.

Ultimately, Rubio urged President Biden to “not let history repeat itself by standing strong against our hemisphere’s brutal dictators.”

“This is not about not inviting Cuba because we want to send a message, or not inviting Nicaragua because we want to send a message, not inviting Maduro because we want to appease some electorate in the United States. It's this: You can't claim to be a summit of democracies if at the table are seated elements that are clearly anti-democratic,” the senator said.