Summary of the main points in President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador’s daily press conference
President Andrés Manuel López Obrador announced that he will send a letter to Genaro García Luna’s lawyer, César de Castro, to protest the latter’s slanderous statements made against him during the trial of the former Minister of Public Security. The President said will no longer sue De Castro for moral damages, because he enjoys impunity under U.S. law, whereby a defense lawyer cannot be sued for slander.
The Mexican government reported that the Federal Attorney General’s Office re-issued three arrest warrants for Genaro García Luna and his wife for crimes related to their participation in the Fast and Furious operation, in which arms were brought from the United States to be supplied to Mexican drug traffickers so they could be traced; for their operation of prisons, which is equivalent to property damage of more than 60 billion pesos (US$3.58 billion), and for illegal and abusive contracts for equipping prisons, which are estimated to have cost the public treasury more than 5 billion pesos (US$290 million).
The head of the Executive Branch denounced the conservatives who use popular demands to deceive the people, as when the National Action Party (PAN) released a taped interview with Vicente Fox to claim that they were the creators of the stipend for senior citizens, but this is a lie. The President exposed their strategy of manipulation by contrasting that message with Fox’s latest interview where he says that social assistance should be withdrawn.
In the section “It wasn’t me who said it”, President López Obrador showed a video of PAN leader Santiago Creel where he says he is the target of reverse discrimination because of his light skin and eye color. The President explained that he has never spoken negatively of the family of the opposition’s possible presidential hopeful nor has he made discriminatory comments about Creel.
The Buenavista-AIFA suburban rail line, which will connect Mexico City with the new Felipe Ángeles International Airport in 39 minutes, is 43% complete. Work is expected to conclude in February 2024 and from April to June operational tests will be conducted.
