On December 20, 1989, the United States invaded Panama with tens of thousands of troops. It was the largest U.S. invasion since Vietnam. The first U.S. military action since the fall of the Berlin Wall one month before. The testing ground for the Iraq wars. The U.S. invading forces destroyed 20,000 homes and killed hundreds of innocent Panamanians,…

In December 1823, U.S. president James Monroe delivered his State of the Union address in which he coined what would become known as the Monroe Doctrine. It was a framework that would later be used to legitimize U.S. intervention up and down the hemisphere. But in those early days, Monroe’s statements were applauded by Latin American leaders as sup…

Panama is, perhaps, the country in the region that has suffered under the longest U.S. shadow—right from the very beginning. The country and the canal would become the United States’ most important asset in the region. The United States installed as many as 100 military bases throughout Panama, during World War II, and it was the base of Washington…

Costa Rica has been called the “Switzerland of Latin America.” In this episode, host Michael Fox takes us on a dive into this so-called peaceful and democratic beacon for a region beset by dictatorships and violence. He looks at the myth Costa Rica has created around the elimination of the military and how the United States did its utmost to encour…

Noam Chomsky needs no introduction. He’s a celebrated linguist, who has long denounced U.S. empire at home and abroad. And he has a long relationship with Latin America. Chomsky’s 1985 book, Turning the Tide: U.S. Intervention in Central America and the Struggle for Peace, was formative for many academics and activists analyzing the U.S. role in th…

In the late 1980s, British film director Alex Cox spent several months in Nicaragua filming his movie Walker, about the U.S. filibuster who invaded and took over the country in the mid-1800s. As Cox puts it, he was trying to make “a revolutionary film in a revolutionary context." That did not go over well in Hollywood. The movie would get him black…

In the early 1980s, U.S. President Ronald Reagan launched a covert war to destroy the fledgling Sandinista revolution in Nicaragua. It was brutal: paramilitary war, CIA attacks, economic blockade, and more. The war wreaked havoc on the country, killing tens of thousands and ravaging the economy. But an international solidarity movement stood up in …

The 1979 Nicaraguan revolution that overthrew a brutal U.S.-backed dictator ushered in a wave of hope in the Central American country. The new Sandinista government launched literacy and healthcare campaigns, carried out land reform and promised to improve the lives of all. But the United States, under President Ronald Reagan, feared the dominos wo…

In 1912, the United States invaded Nicaragua and began what would become the longest U.S. occupation in Latin American history. The occupation would birth both a dictatorship and one of Latin America’s most important revolutionary heroes: Augusto Sandino. Sandino would wage a six-year-long guerrilla insurgency to rid Nicaragua of the U.S. Marines. …

William Walker was a journalist, lawyer, and physician from Nashville, Tennessee, who in 1855 invaded Nicaragua with a few dozen troops and conquered the country. At the time, he was one of thousands of private U.S. citizens who had their sights set on taking over foreign nations, all in the name of Manifest Destiny. In this episode, host Michael F…

A New York court has found former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernández guilty of drug trafficking and weapons possession. It’s a huge verdict that will likely see the former president imprisoned for life. In the last episode of Under The Shadow, host Michael Fox looked deeply at Hernández’s time as president from 2014 to 2022, which many came …

In June 2009, Honduras faced a devastating coup that shattered the country’s fragile democracy and sunk the country into violence, repression, and a decade-long narco-dictatorship. But the people fought back. In this continuation of Episode 7, host Michael Fox looks at the fallout of the 2009 coup in Honduras, walking from 2009 into the present. He…

In June 2009, a devastating coup shattered Honduras’s fragile democracy and sunk the country into violence, repression, and a decade-long narco-dictatorship. But the people fought back. In this episode, host Michael Fox dives into the tremendous resistance to the 2009 coup. He looks at the government of ousted president Manuel Zelaya, the Latin Ame…

In the 1980s, Honduras was ground zero for U.S. operations in Central America. It was a base of operations for the U.S.-trained, funded, and backed Contras, in their war against Nicaragua’s Sandinista government. And it was a staging ground for U.S. military involvement and CIA missions in the region. Within the country, that meant using the same s…

El Salvador’s president Nayib Bukele has been reelected. While the official results aren’t yet in, with 70 percent of the ballots counted, Bukele has received an astounding 83 percent of the votes. He declared victory on Sunday night over X, formerly Twitter. Host Michael Fox was on the ground for the election. He takes us there and sits down for a…

Guatemala's new president Bernardo Arévalo was inaugurated on January 14. But it did not come off without a hitch. Outgoing opposition lawmakers did their best to try to stymie the swearing-in of Arévalo and some of his party members. Arévalo’s supporters rallied in Guatemala City. As we looked at in Episode 2, Bernardo Arévalo is the son of Guatem…

Today, we look at Radio Venceremos—a grassroots guerrilla radio station that broadcast throughout El Salvador’s Civil War, denounced violent state repression, and inspired a nation. In this episode, Michael Fox travels to San Salvador, where he visits the Museum of Word and Image, the home of the archives of Radio Venceremos. He hears from former m…

1980s El Salvador was ground zero for the U.S. intervention in Central America. The United States funneled over $6 billion to El Salvador in mostly military aid and police and security training throughout the country’s 12-year civil war, which lasted from 1980 until 1992. The violence and the U.S. support for the country's bloody authoritarian regi…

Two hundred years ago, on December 2, 1823, then-president James Monroe delivered his State of the Union address to Congress. In his address, he laid out what would become both one of the most consequential and devastating ideas for Latin America—the Monroe Doctrine. We look back on the history of the Monroe Doctrine and the devastating impact on t…

In this episode, host Michael Fox looks at the outsized role of the U.S. banana corporation, United Fruit, in Central America. You literally can't talk about the history of Central America in the 20th Century without mentioning it. Fox goes in search of the legacy of the company today. He travels to the Guatemalan town of Tiquisate, which was built…

In this episode, host Michael Fox visits a memorial for the disappeared on the outskirts of the Guatemalan town of San Juan Comalapa. He walks back in time to the 1980s, into the country’s genocide of Indigenous peoples, uncovering the overwhelming support from the United States and then President Ronald Reagan in the name of fighting the so-called…

On Jan. 8th, thousands of Bolsonaro supporters stormed Brazil's capital in a failed attempt to spark a military coup. In scenes that drew instant comparison to the events of Jan. 6th, 2021 in the US, Bolsonaro supporters smashed windows, destroyed artwork, and even climbed on the roofs of government buildings before being rounded up and arrested en…

Former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva won the Brazilian presidency on October 30th. He defeated far-right president Jair Bolsonaro by just over 2 million votes. Tens of thousands of Lula supporters descended on Sao Paulo’s Paulista Avenue for huge celebrations. Brazil on Fire host Michael Fox was there and he takes us to the streets. But Bolso…

The first round of Brazil’s elections has come and gone. As expected, former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva was the big winner, with 48 percent. But he fell short of winning outright. Current president Jair Bolsonaro exceeded expectations and came in just a handful of points behind the former president. And it’s going to mean weeks of intense …

The Amazon is a place that both Brazil’s former military regime and President Jair Bolsonaro have eyed with dreams of development, looking to take advantage of bountiful resources. It’s a place where Bolsonaro’s deconstruction of state institutions is wreaking havoc. Where illegal and armed actors are pushing into formerly protected areas and plund…

Brazil’s military dictatorship was a dark time in the country’s history. Hundreds were killed. Thousands jailed and tortured. And it is an era that President Jair Bolsonaro remembers with nostalgia. It's the place where he got his start and something he has long championed as being worthy of returning to. As president, Bolsonaro has called for the …

Brazil has a long and complicated history with fascism, going back to the early 20th century. Far-right and white supremacist groups have been emboldened by President Jair Bolsonaro—with some members of his own cabinet openly sporting Nazi tattoos. They’ve unleashed online attacks, pushed fake news and misinformation in favor of Bolsonaro, and thre…

Jair Bolsonaro could not have won the presidency without the support of one very important group: Evangelical Christians. There is, perhaps, no other group that Bolsonaro has so vocally courted, or that has been so loyal to the president. And they remain key for Bolsonaro’s hopes of recapturing the presidency this year. In this episode, we visit th…

The election of President Jair Bolsonaro was never a foregone conclusion. For most of that electoral season, someone else was ahead in the polls. But he was jailed on supposed corruption charges by a biased judge, six months out from the election, and blocked from running. In this episode, we look at the fight to free former president Luiz Inácio L…

As candidate Jair Bolsonaro neared the presidency in 2018, violence rippled across Brazil, mostly perpetrated by Bolsonaro supporters. Hundreds of threats and attacks, including several killings, were reported in the weeks and months leading up to the election. ​​Bolsonaro's hateful rhetoric and fake news machine spurred on the violence, painting t…

Jair Bolsonaro's presidency has been a disaster for Brazil. Over 650,000 dead from Covid-19. Amazon deforestation. Rising fascism. Budget cuts. Fake news. Threats to democracy. In this introduction to Brazil on Fire, host journalist Michael Fox sets the scene for the podcast by looking back on the last four years and why understanding Bolsonaro's r…

First episodes coming this September! Jair Bolsonaro's rise was unimaginable just a few years before his election as president of Brazil. With an impending showdown between the incumbent Bolsonaro and popular left-wing former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, many suspect Bolsonaro may resort to a January 6-style coup to retain power. In this sp…

Mas de 15 años después de la publicación de Periodistas y magnates, el libro de Guillermo Mastrini y Marín Becerra que ofreció un análisis de la concentración mediática en Sudamérica y México, en un campo mediático atravesado por la creciente digitalización, nos preguntamos: ¿Qué tanto ha cambiado la concentración mediática en América Latina? En es…

Helen talks to guest editor and contributor Bret Gustafson about Caribbean energy structures, and how US administrations from Reagan to now have pushed fossil fuel dependency in the Caribbean as a “national security” concern. Read NACLA: nacla.org Support NACLA: nacla.org/donate Follow NACLA on X: https://twitter.com/NACLA…

Helen takes a deep dive with Jonathan Devore, author of the latest NACLA Report’s feature essay on the early days of the Brazilian Odebrecht Company in rural Bahia. Rural residents’ memories and perspective on Odebrecht add new dimensions to the Petrobras scandal, which is now reverberating throughout the region— How does bringing in often overlook…

Andrea Bolivar did most of her dissertation research in Chicago, spending time with and learning from the trans Latina women whose experiences in the sex industry have emerged from a confluence of transphobia, racism, and criminalization. Read NACLA: nacla.org Support NACLA: nacla.org/donate Follow NACLA on X: https://twitter.com/NACLA…

NACLA Report contributor Moira Birss talks with Helen about how private companies and governments in Latin America have criminalized environmental human rights defenders, and how a confluence of violence, harassment, smear campaigns, and policing tactics threatens to silence environmental justice movements throughout the Americas. Read NACLA: nacla…

Helen speaks with NACLA Report contributor Marisol LeBrón, whose article for the latest issue of the Report traces the Puerto Rican state’s policing and surveillance programs from the 1950s to now. They discuss the internal complexities at play in Puerto Rican politics beyond the colonial dynamic between the U.S. government and Puerto Rico, and Mar…

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49.2.3: DREAMs Beyond DACA by NACLARadio Read NACLA: nacla.org Support NACLA: nacla.org/donate Follow NACLA on X: https://twitter.com/NACLAPar NACLARadio

49.2.2: Mike Bustamante on Cuba by NACLARadio Read NACLA: nacla.org Support NACLA: nacla.org/donate Follow NACLA on X: https://twitter.com/NACLAPar NACLARadio

Nara Milanich discusses family detention centers, the asylum process, and the fight to protect immigrant rights. Read NACLA: nacla.org Support NACLA: nacla.org/donate Follow NACLA on X: https://twitter.com/NACLAPar NACLARadio

Helen talks with NACLA Report contributor Devyn Spence Benson about the history of racism and antiracism in Cuba, the legacy of Fidel Castro and the Cuban Revolution, and Afro Cuban activism today. Read NACLA: nacla.org Support NACLA: nacla.org/donate Follow NACLA on X: https://twitter.com/NACLAPar NACLARadio

In this episode of NACLA Radio, Helen talks with NACLA Report contributor Julia Buxton about the current state of opposition to the Maduro government, the tactics and conversation around legitimacy, and the place of groups advocating for the rights of Afro-Venezeulans, Indigenous Venezuelans, women, and LGBTQI people. Listen to the end for a brief …

Guest producer Julia Burnell brings us some excerpts from her interview with Chilean musician Nano Stern, who is currently touring North America. Nano will be at Verso Books on Friday, March 17th, at 6:30pm to discuss activism and art with NACLA and to share some of his music. Read the full interview in the latest issue of the NACLA Report, "#Black…

Helen talks with NACLA Report contributor Geraldo Cadava about the history of Latino conservatism in the United States, and on how Latinos voted in last November’s election. Read NACLA: nacla.org Support NACLA: nacla.org/donate Follow NACLA on X: https://twitter.com/NACLAPar NACLARadio

Helen talks to NACLA contributor Ben Cowan about the recent right turn in Brazilian politics, the resurgence of the "Beef, Bullets, and Bible" caucus in Brazilian congress, and the new right's flirtation with its own sort of identity politics. Read NACLA: nacla.org Support NACLA: nacla.org/donate Follow NACLA on X: https://twitter.com/NACLA…

Helen catches up with Manuel Perez Rocha following the decision on the Pacific Rim vs. El Salvador case. Read NACLA: nacla.org Support NACLA: nacla.org/donate Follow NACLA on X: https://twitter.com/NACLAPar NACLARadio

48.3: Bret Gustafson & Niki Fabricant on Morales and extractive industry in Bolivia by NACLARadio Read NACLA: nacla.org Support NACLA: nacla.org/donate Follow NACLA on X: https://twitter.com/NACLAPar NACLARadio

48.3: Manuel Perez-Rocha on Free Trade and Investor Disputes by NACLARadio Read NACLA: nacla.org Support NACLA: nacla.org/donate Follow NACLA on X: https://twitter.com/NACLAPar NACLARadio