Elizabeth Warren’s Support for Bolivia Coup Consistent With Other Pro-Empire Positions

Hell, she's a booster of the siege of Venezuela for clinging to the 'wrong' leader

Massachusetts Senator and Democratic Presidential nomination frontrunner Elizabeth Warren endorsed the recent U.S. backed military coup d’état in Bolivia Monday. Warren’s statement carefully avoided using the word “coup,” and instead referred to the new government of Jeanine Añez as an “interim leadership,” effectively validating the new administration.

She stated that the Bolivian people “deserve free and fair elections, as soon as possible,” implying that the October 20 vote, won convincingly by President Evo Morales, was not clean, thus taking essentially the same position as the Trump administration, who made no secret of their relief that Morales was ousted.

Morales was forced to resign on November 10, after Bolivian army generals demanded he step down just weeks after winning another term in office. He fled to Mexico, where he was granted asylum. He was replaced by Jeanine Añez, whose right-wing Democrat Social Movement Party won only 4% of the vote in October. Añez, a Christian conservative, described Bolivia’s indigenous majority as “satanic,” claiming they should not live in cities, but be confined to the country’s more remote Chaco desert or highland regions. Declaring she was “committed to taking all measures necessary to pacify” dissent against her rule, she pre-exonerated security forces of all crimes in dealing with protests. Those forces have since carried out massacres and repression across the country.

In contrast, Warren’s rival for the Democratic candidacy, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders has expressed unequivocal opposition to the events. “I oppose the intervention of Bolivia’s security forces in the democratic process and their repression of Indigenous protesters,” he said, adding that, “When the military intervened and asked President Evo Morales to leave, in my view, that’s called a coup.”

In a televised interview, Sanders also pushed back against pro-regime change journalist Jorge Ramos, claiming that “Morales did a very good job in alleviating poverty and in giving the indigenous people of Bolivia a voice they never had before.

While the coup quickly sparked condemnation from left-of-center figures around the world, including Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), UK Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and former Brazilian President Lula da Silva, Sanders is, to date, the only Democratic Presidential hopeful to oppose the coup. Former Vice-President Joe Biden has not commented on the situation. Hawaii Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard, who has made anti-imperialism a central focus of her campaign, has also remained silent. When asked about the events in Bolivia on November 11, she responded that she was still gathering information and would later make a full statement. However, over a week later she has yet to comment. Meanwhile, Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) fled the interview when asked to comment about Bolivia.

Warren’s position on Bolivia is consistent with her other relatively hawkish foreign policy positions. On the Pod Save America podcast, she declared her support for President Trump’s Venezuela policy, stating that she “supports economic sanctions” against the country, claiming that President Maduro “is willing to let his own people starve.” She described the Venezuelan leader as “obviously a dictator, he’s terrible, he’s stole this election.” On recognition of U.S.-backed self-declared President Juan Guaidó, who, last weekend, as MintPress News reported, attempted a third coup attempt, she declared “I’m all for it.”

A recent report estimated that the sanctions against Venezuela, which were declared illegal by the United Nations, were responsible for 40,000 deaths between 2017-18 alone. One American UN Rapporteur described them as “akin to a medieval siege” and declared the Trump administration guilty of “crimes against humanity.”

Warren has also favored economic warfare against other U.S. government enemies, pushing for sanctions against North Korea, Russia and Iran, who she describes as a “significant threat” to the U.S., refusing to rule out an attack on the Islamic Republic. In contrast, Sanders opposed those sanctions.

In the midst of Israel’s 2014 assault on Gaza –“Operation Protective Edge” ­–where Israeli forces killed more than 2000 Palestinians, the Massachusetts Senator repeated Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s defense of bombing civilian targets. “When Hamas puts its rocket launchers next to hospitals, next to schools, they’re using their civilian population to protect their military assets,” she stated at a town hall, failing to suggest where Hamas could locate its military installations in one of the most densely populated areas of the world. “Israel has a right, at that point, to defend itself,” she added.

Polls show Warren and Sanders locked at the front of the race for the Democratic Presidential nomination. Despite commentary declaring their positions and outlooks virtually indistinguishable, recent shifts in domestic policy, particularly on Medicare-for-All, are making this notion increasingly hard to maintain. And the two senators’ response to Bolivia puts into stark relief the differences in what a Warren or a Sanders-led administration would look like.

Source: MintPressNews

10 Comments
  1. Mary E says

    And Warren has so many great plans for the US and its people! Now, backing Guiado,
    the CIA’s man in Venezuela, I can’t vote for her…The US should just stay out of other countries’ business, but they have to have their oil(V) and lithium (B)…and go to war for those natural resources instead of buying it which would be a Win-Win….but the US
    HAS TO BE JUST A WINNER take all….and decimated landscapes left in ruins…

  2. Mark says

    It’s all about getting control over the world’s largest known supply of lithium, an essential component in Electric Vehicle (EV) batteries. The USA will try to keep the hydrocarbon economy going as long as possible because it claims to be an energy exporter, but it knows the gas-powered car’s days are numbered. Progressives aim for all newly-manufactured cars in North America being EV’s by 2030, and for all gas-powered cars to be off the roads by 2040. Those are just numbers, but for the first time the goal is starting to look achievable. If anything like it comes to pass, lithium will be the new oil. And Washington aims to control it. Bolivia holds better than 70% of the world’s known supply.

    https://news.yahoo.com/bolivia-huge-untapped-reserves-gears-soaring-lithium-demand-013650510.html

    China’s stake in Bolivia was very likely the alarm bell that triggered the coup.

    1. Mary E says

      That’s right! The US cannot have China and Russia ‘intervening’ in their evil plot to steal Bolivia’s lithium and Venezuela’s oil! But the Chinese and Russians are
      INVESTING big money into those countries’ infrastructures and make their
      ‘interference’ a Win-Win situation….Washington will lose this one…bigtime..
      (Hey we can hope can’t we?!)

  3. Vish says

    Elizabeth Warren=Hillary Clinton Lite

    That is why the (liberal) America establishment and its free press are propagandizing for her so heavily.

    This is opposed to Donald Trump (and TrumpTard supporters), who are nothing more than the White Barack Obama.

  4. CHUCKMAN says

    She’s the perfect example of America’s idea of a “liberal.”

    No one can support such violent and undemocratic acts as the coup in Bolivia and honestly call themselves liberal.

    It’s understood that Right-wing thugs like those in Trump’s government alway support such activities.

    But American politics offer no real alternatives to voters. The establishment, both parties, are together on that.

    And note how she goes unquestioned on such issues by the corporate press.

    That’s what it means to live at the center of empire.

    Those interested in the subject might enjoy:

    https://chuckmanwordsincomments.wordpress.com/2018/07/22/john-chuckman-comment-how-american-politics-really-work-why-there-are-terrible-candidates-and-constant-wars-and-peoples-problems-are-ignored-why-heroes-like-julian-assange-are-persecuted-and-r/

    1. Mary E says

      It looks like Warren has started taking Big Corporate money…didn’t think she did that before, but, whatever….the US will never be free of the corporate takeover of government and election process,… disgusting to say the least!

    2. persianlilacs says

      When it comes to US foreign policy, Ds and Rs tend to align themselves with each other. They’ll claim they don’t. But in reality they very much do.

  5. JustPassingThrough says

    another example of an above average braindead murikan.

    1. Canosin says

      a terrible woman….. insane…. bizarre…..
      how’s possible she became a Senator in the first place… .?
      guess it’s a rhetorical question…..

  6. Garry Compton says

    Have No idea what Planet these people that work for the NWO are on. It’s as if, they are all programmed the exact same way, and that reality, common sense, and the obvious normal conclusions – have been totally wiped – out.

Reply To Canosin
Cancel Reply

Your email address will not be published.

Anti-Empire