masm Alpha ci here they are specified to the vice president of the Northern triangle, Ricardo Zuniga, who is a special envoy for the Northern triangle and Juan Gonzalez, Special Assistant to the President and NSC Senior Director for the Western Hemisphere. This is the entrance if I ever seen one, okay. We got like, Music Welcome. And my name is Simone Sanders and I'm a senior advisor and chief spokesperson to the Vice President, we would like to provide an overview of what you can expect tomorrow on the ground. Again, this briefing will be on the record embargo brief but impactful it is not on embargo. This on the record. So for the Vice President, this is her first trip abroad since inauguration. And this is about addressing the root causes and acute factors of migration, and building partnerships to enhance our shared security and build a more hopeful future for the people of the Northern triangle. On Guatemala, I would like to give you all some specific context of over a month ago, Vice President Paris held a bilateral meeting with Guatemalan president Alejandro Yama, Ted, the two sides agreed to strengthen bilateral efforts around managing migration across several areas, from border security, to law enforcement cooperation, to combating migrant smuggling, to establishing orderly channels for migrants to creating conditions on the ground to attract investment. And they also agreed on the very, very, very, very, very important issue of combating corruption. Now with that, I would like to hand it over to Ambassador Nancy mceldowney. Wilkins is senior adviser to the national security adviser to the Vice President, Nancy, Ambassador.
Thank you so much, I'll try to maintain the same. It'll be hard,
it's it will be hard. Thank you very much for being here. I'm delighted to have a chance to chat with you a couple of thoughts about what the Vice President hopes to do, why she's here and some of the things that are going to be happening over the next couple of days. First of all, she is here as part of this administration's overall effort to restore American leadership around the world. Her trip here in Guatemala and to Mexico will be followed by the President's trip across Europe. And this is a part of the administration's commitment, not just for leadership, but also rebuilding relationships rebuilding. Here in Guatemala, she is going to have engagements with the government to meet with the President. But she's also going to meet a lot of people from all walks of life, community leaders, business leaders, she's going to really read the full range. And what she wants to do is hear from all of the individuals that she's going to meet with, so that she can advance a very comprehensive agenda, a strategy that the vice president has elaborated, that takes into account the need to grow the Guatemalan economy, to deal with the climate crisis and the food insecurity that has resulted to work to combat poverty, violence and corruption. So let me tell you about a couple of things that are happening in terms of her meetings, and then we can open it up for questions. earlier tonight, she met with and thanked the US embassy staff member the Pew in person, and many virtually. And the vice president conveyed her very deep gratitude on on behalf of President and herself for the service and the sacrifice of not just the Americans but also the Guatemalans who work at our embassy, she's proud she was there were how grateful all Americans. They are here to protect our national interests as well as American citizen interest and to try to shut down. Tomorrow she has a bilateral meeting with President Sharma. today. We will again touch on all the aspects of the broad agenda economic cooperation, strengthening rule of law and deepening bilateral
cooperation.
She will then meet with Guatemalan community leaders. Many of these individuals she met with virtually last one but there will be a number that are new. And these people have incredibly poignant stories to tell. People have faced hardship, who have incredibly courageous I'm trying to fight for their rights for a better life, Guatemala and their stories have helped inform the President's thinking have helped inform the gravity that she is developing for this country and for this region. She's also going to meet with Guatemalan innovators and entrepreneurs, young people, young women who are studying to the right to have a better future and a number of women who have really faced hardship, and have built out businesses of their own. And that will be quite inspiring as she meets with these women who have done such great things. So let me start with that. That's the basic lay down of the visit. We've talked about a number of things that we have on our agenda, and we're happy to take questions from this incredibly distinguished panels. Thank you. Thank you.
Okay, we can take a couple of questions. All we're raising our hands that is very common, Jeremy Donovan's investment methods, I am sort of new to do want to give us kind of a big picture here. What, why was why was it important for the vice president to make this her first foreign trip years, Guatemala into the northern triangle at large? And what message do you hope that that will send to the region and to the world by prioritizing this region First,
the Vice President came here as part of her overall effort to focus on diplomacy with the northern triangle countries of the Northern triangle in Mexico. And she comes here with a message of hope, of building hope for the people of this region. And she has spoken recently about her empathy, for the suffering that many of the people here experience, the result of two devastating hurricanes, many people have been pushing poverty, they're facing food insecurity. It's been displaced from their homes that were destroyed. COVID has ravaged many of the rural communities. And she came to build out the partnership between our two governments, but also between the people of the United States and the people of Guatemala. He speaks of why this was the first place that she went. And it shows the priority that she places on the strategy that she's building out on the cooperation between our two countries. But it's important, we value this place, we want to try to be helpful.
We'll go maybe just for an overall question on on something that we learned earlier today about an announcement that is likely to come from the administration on anti corruption efforts. So if you could talk a little bit about what more we can expect to hear from the administration or from the vice president tomorrow.
I'm happy to get started and others can jump in. I think you all are aware that on June 3, President Biden issued a national security study memorandum that identified fighting corruption as a key national security priority for us. We are working that when every country in the world is part of our global strategy. Because we recognize that corruption has such an insidious impact on society, and on governments. And so looking at the impact of production, something that we're doing in all of our relationships, and it is also a key part of trying to get into the root causes what what prompts people to flee from their homes. Part of it is insecurity. Part of it is violence and poverty and homelessness. But another part of it is corruption because people lose trust in the institutions. And they feel that they can't get a fair shake as they're trying to perceive their lives and their businesses. So corruption is a part of our dialogue with Guatemala with all of the countries of the Northern triangle as well as worldwide. We expect that it will be featured in our conversations tomorrow. We will talk to you tomorrow about announcements coming out of the visit once the meetings are done, and we just had our discussions of a number of things to share with you on this.
But just to say it is something For us anything you can preview for us tonight. Nothing more than that what I've shared with you now. Okay, great. Well, thanks, guys for doing this. I guess I have like two or three parties. And they just declared
only because only because I want to clarify with them and say, What is the definition of this scope of corruption? In your view? Is it government plus? Is it just government? Because I think you'll talk to a leader tomorrow.
SOS told us that, in his view, it's not just government, it's business. It's been a weapon sector, and we'll look at it look, absolutely, you're talking about corruption really does SAP, the wealth of any country depicted in Central America is at a scale where it is a large percentage of gdp across the region. And, as a member mentioned, you see, corruption is one of the most important root causes to be dealt with. The scope is what it is, every aspect is what someone encounters when they faced, you know, a lack of justice in their own community, because they can't get a gang member dealt with by the police, because they might have, you know, a relationship, they might have been a gang member might have a certain amount of protection, or it can be a business evading taxes. The Guatemalan government has talked to us about the massive scale of corruption around their port, which is, which costs like billions of dollars a year to the economy of Guatemala. And then you have what the what is reported in Guatemala reporting, of course, what organizations identify as corruption around politics, whether that's financing of political campaigns, using drug money, or whether it's the kind of graph you might find some places all over the world. In the case of Guatemala, the challenge is that it's not different. I mean, it's working fine in many parts of the Americas and many parts of the world. The problem is the impact that it has on the society and on maintaining low standard of living for a large percentage, has a real impact, not just on Guatemala, but on the region of Mexico and the United States, because it is a driver of migration. So that's why it is that is a very long answer to a short question.
The key frustration for them when they hear us talk about the other question is, I haven't heard any mention of vaccine diplomacy. Will there be any discussion tomorrow?
So obviously, call on Thursday, the Vice President didn't call president, gamma Terry, in addition to call the president Lopez Obrador. And the chairman of CARICOM, and Prime Minister Modi two, yes. Wanted to get them all in for you to let them know about the announcement that the United States would start sending the first 25 million of their global vaccine allocation. So the vice president was able to call for the Yamato prior to that announcement being made. During that phone call, they did not discuss what kind of obtains are coming or how many vaccines they will be getting. So I could imagine absolutely, that that information vaccines are on the table for discussion. Tomorrow, we'll go to Sabrina, Politico, and then we'll call the back Mary Alice, and then we'll have time to answer more questions probably tomorrow morning, but I know everyone would like to make it to our next destination. Thank you for doing this. So I have a question. If you know the
gentleman j and the vice president in their conversation agree to kind of explore establish more orderly channels for migrants which you talked about, has any progress been made on that from when we're talking about more legal pathways asylum where we add on that? So Well, first, I would say yeah,
