When the leaders of the continent meet this week in Angels to top of the americasThe spotlight will likely turn from applying political changes to common issues — immigration, climate change, hyperinflation — to something Hollywood likes: drama on the red carpet.

Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador leads a list of leaders threatening to stay at home in protest of the United States’ exclusion from a summit of authoritarian leaders of Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela, for which some experts say the event could become a source. An embarrassment to US President Joe Biden. Some progressive Democrats have even criticized the administration for bowing to pressure from Cuban exiles in Florida and excluding communist Cuba, which has attended the past two summits.

The real question is why government Biden “He didn’t do his homework,” said Jorge Castañeda, a former Mexican foreign minister who now teaches at New York University.

Although the US government insists on it Biden will be set in Angels Castañeda said his vision for a “sustainable, strong and equitable future” for the hemisphere, made clear by the last-minute controversy over the guest list that Latin america Not a priority for the President of the United States.

“This ambitious agenda, no one knows exactly what it is, is beyond a series of platitudes,” he said.

The United States is hosting the summit for the first time since it opened in Miami in 1994, as part of efforts to bolster support for a free trade agreement that stretches from Alaska to Patagonia.

But that goal was abandoned more than 15 years ago amid the rise of leftist governments in the region. As Chinese influence expands, most countries expect – and need – less from Washington. As a result, the main forum for regional cooperation has weakened, sometimes becoming a theater for the expression of historical grievances, as happened when the late Venezuelan leader Hugo Chávez gave US President Barack Obama A copy of Eduardo Galeano’s classic treatise, “Open Veins Latin america: Five Centuries of Continent Looting”, during the 2009 summit in Trinidad and Tobago.

The rapprochement between the United States and its old foe Cuba, sealed by the handshake of Obama and Raul Castro at the 2015 summit in Panama, lowered some ideological tensions.

“It’s a huge missed opportunity,” Ben Rhodes, who led the warmth with Cuba from his position as Deputy National Security Adviser in the Obama administration, said on the “Pod Save the World” podcast.

“We are isolating ourselves by taking this step because you have Mexico, and there are Caribbean countries that say they won’t come, which is something that will make Cuba look stronger than us,” he added.