Brazil and Mexico finally recognise Biden as US President

Brazil and Mexico: After weeks of waiting for legal challenges to clear up against US presidential election results, Brazilian and Mexican presidents finally acknowledged Joe Biden’s as the US next president. On Tuesday afternoon, Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro shared a messaged on Twitter, saying, “Greetings to President Joe Biden with my best wishes and the hope that the US continues to be the land of the free and the home of the brave. I will be ready to work with the new government.” 

Rubens Ricupero, Brazil’s former ambassador to the US expressed shock towards Bolsonaro’s delay. “It’s a lunatic reaction that is utterly lacking in any kind of diplomatic logic … Any diplomat with their head screwed on knows this is madness,” Ricupero said.

Even Brazilian vice-president, Hamilton Mourão, failed to reason the delay in Brazilian leader’s recognition of Biden’s win and when asked about the Bolsonaro’s intention behind the move, said: “I don’t know.”

Besides Bolsonaro, Mexican President, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, also extended equally cold greetings to Biden. In his two-page letter addressed to the US democrat leader, AMLO along with recognising Biden’s presidency, also wrapped in a subtle warning to the new state head to implement the policy of non-interference in foreign affairs. His letter read: “We have the certainty with you in the [US] presidency it will be possible to continue applying the basic principles of foreign policy established in our constitution; especially that of non-intervention.”

AMLO’s letter to Biden was a stark contrast to the one written to Donald Trump. One of its contrasting feature was its length as the Mexican leader send a seven-page message to Trump, after he himself came to power in 2018. AMLO justified delay in congratulating Biden by emphasising that it was Mexico’s policy of non-intervention in foreign affairs. He said, “With regard to the US election, we are going to wait until all the legal matters have been resolved. I can’t congratulate one candidate or the other. I want to wait until the electoral process is over.”

But this might not be the case as he seemed to be indirectly rooting for Trump as he equated, what Trump called election fraud, with the allegations of fraud he faced in two presidential elections Mexican leader contested, in 2006 and 2012, before winning the third one in 2018.

Slamming AMLO’s move, Gabriel Guerra Castellanos, a former Mexican diplomat, tweeted, “Having read AMLO’s congratulatory letter to Biden, I can only say it would have been better if he had not congratulated him. If someone from this side of the border doesn’t intervene, we will have four icy years in the US-Mexico relationship.”

Brazil and Mexico’s congratulatory acknowledgement was both delayed and rude, which could impact the US ties with Brazil and Mexico for the next four years.