Guyana backing controversial US candidate in unprecedented bid for IDB presidency

meaning they would need more support to hold up a vote, Reuters noted.

An Argentine government source told Reuters that the US bid for the IDB position was less about the region’s development and more about countering China, as well as an attempt to win over voters in Florida who agree with Claver-Carone’s hardline approach on socialist-run Cuba and Venezuela.

The source said delaying the election by forcing a postponement would be “difficult, but not impossible.”

A second Argentine official told Reuters that a delay beyond the Sept. 12 vote was “an option that would suit us” and said the country was confident its candidate would gain Mexico’s backing.

Chile and Peru, which are run by centrist governments and control less than 5% of IDB votes combined, have yet to state their position.

Latin American former presidents and ministers from across the political spectrum have expressed opposition to the nomination of Claver-Carone, including from Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Colombia. In the United States, Reuters said that Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy said Claver-Carone was “the wrong nominee,” calling him the “architect” of Trump’s “most ideologically-driven policies” toward the region.

Susana Malcorra, a foreign minister in Argentina’s previous conservative administration who signed a letter opposing the U.S. candidate, told Reuters the region needed “to find a way to put a halt to this process” to give Latin American countries a chance to settle on a consensus candidate.

Benjamin Gedan, director of the Wilson Center’s Argentina Project in Washington, said that a rejection of Claver-Carone “would be a black eye for the Trump administration, showing waning influence.” If Trump loses the presidency, and Claver-Carone won the vote, Latin Americans may end up with a lame duck head of the regional bank, he posited.

On Sunday, a top European Union diplomat called for a delay in the vote to choose the new president.

In a July 30 letter seen by Reuters, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell cited the coronavirus pandemic and the nomination of Claver-Carone as reasons to postpone the planned Sept. 12 vote until after March.

“This postponement is more advisable if we consider the submission, without precedent, of a candidacy to preside (at) the Bank by the United States Government,” Borrell wrote in the letter to Spanish Foreign Minister Arancha Gonzalez Laya.

A senior U.S. administration official told Reuters the EU was not party to the IDB as an entity, and all member states had agreed to the virtual September election.

“Any effort by a minority of countries, let alone by non-regional countries, to hijack the election process would be an affront to the region and be challenged,” the official said.

Luis Almagro, Secretary General of the Organization of American States, also pushed back in a tweet on Sunday: “The region is independent, sovereign and can maturely make its own decisions.”