Nayib Bukele: “I am a Radical Leftist”

Written By B.J. Dichter, Posted on February 23, 2024

CPAC Keynote Speaker: Self-Proclaimed Radical Leftist. How Did This Happen?

On February 22, 2044, Nayib Bukele, President of El Salvador, gave the opening keynote speech at CPAC, the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington D.C.

If you found it unusual that a Central American President gave an opening speech at an American Conservative Conference, you are not alone. Many people in El Salvador and abroad are quite perplexed by this, as on the surface, Bukele’s views in Spanish seem to be in contravention of the goals and world views of most CPAC attendees.

Bukele is celebrated by some establishment conservatives as a hero for mass jailing 60,000+ street gang members in El Salvador years after he first took office. Salvadoran gangs had long been holding El Salvador hostage, particularly in poorer areas of the country, consistent with most Latin American countries. Families were often extorted, children were kidnapped, daughters were taken as property, and anyone who complained was executed. The usual suspects on the woke left, outraged by the incarceration, saw the mass arrests of gangs as, the suspension of civil rights in line with a dictator. Many were quick to dismiss these claims; however, could it be they were on to something? More on that later.

“La derecha cree que debe haber la ley de la jungla, que no hay reglas y que los empresarios van a hacer lo que quieran, porque al final los empresarios van a tener un rebalse que llegará a los pobres. Entre esas dos opciones, de cómo se manejará el Estado, yo me identifico con la izquierda.” – Nayib Bukele

There are legitimate concerns ignored by thought leaders on the political right, just as the political left ignores Justin Trudeau’s authoritarian tactics and repeated racist theatrics of dressing in Blackface throughout his life. What are conservatives turning a blind eye to? It turns out, there is a lot.

I spoke at a conference in San Salvador, El Salvador’s capital, in November 2023 on the topic of Bitcoin and how Bitcoin was the only money that was not digitally blocked by the Trudeau-Doug Ford Regime. Both Trudeau and Ford used unethical tactics and legal manipulation to freeze and block donations to the truckers who waited in the frigid cold for almost three weeks. In addition to speaking about the Freedom Convoy, I had an ulterior motive in traveling to El Salvador, which I will go into detail in a subsequent article. However, right now, I want to focus on the absurdity of Nayib Bukele speaking at CPAC, what is supposed to be a conservative conference.

Tucker Carlson famously interviewed Bukele, helping to introduce him to the American conservative audience, inferring that Bukele was a conservative. Was that accurate? From what I learned in El Salvador, no, that is not accurate at all. Not even in the slightest.

“Look, what I can say is that I am a radical leftist because I want radical changes in El Salvador, where the ‘law of the jungle’ should no longer prevail.” – Nayib Bukele

Nayib Bukele is the leader of the center-left party he helped create, Nuevas Ideas (New Ideas). It might be shallow to ask, but is the name “New Ideas” consistent with the framing of any conservative party? The actual conservative party in El Salvador, called Arena (Alianza Republicana Nacionalista), would say no, and it is important to mention, that ARENA has significant credibility issues. Corruption by high-ranking ARENA officials is one of the main reasons the political party has low credibility with Salvadoran voters in 2023. An example of corruption by ARENA members is their four presidents, but that does not make Bukele’s Nuevas Ideas or Nayib Bukele himself conservative. Being skilled at manipulating Twitter also does not make one conservative. Then why did Carlson do this?

More alarming was an interview conducted with Bukele in 2012 when he was mayor of the municipality of Nuevo Cuscatlán, conducted by the Huffington Post. I normally would not quote such a discredited publication had it not been for Bukele’s direct quotes. Here are some of them, and I am making sure to quote in context, as the context of his statements is self-evident.

1. “Es que soy de izquierda; toda la vida he sido de izquierda y mi pensamiento es de izquierda y no veía otra opción más que el FMLN, que es la única expresión de la izquierda en El Salvador.”

Translation: “I am a leftist; all my life I have been a leftist and my thinking is leftist and I did not see any other option but the FMLN, which is the only expression of the left in El Salvador.”

2. “La derecha cree que debe haber la ley de la jungla, que no hay reglas y que los empresarios van a hacer lo que quieran, porque al final los empresarios van a tener un rebalse que llegará a los pobres. Entre esas dos opciones, de cómo se manejará el Estado, yo me identifico con la izquierda.”

Translation: “The right-wing believes that there should be the law of the jungle, that there are no rules and that businessmen will do whatever they want because in the end, businessmen will have an overflow [of capital] that will reach the poor. Between these two options, of how the State will be managed, I identify myself with the left.“

Interesting that Nayib Bukele would describe conservatism with such hostility yet be invited to speak at CPAC.

Here is another quote.

3. “Mira, lo que puedo opinar es que soy de izquierda radical porque quiero cambios radicales en El Salvador, donde no debe imperar más la ‘ley de la jungla’.”

Translation: “Look, what I can say is that I am a radical leftist because I want radical changes in El Salvador, where the ‘law of the jungle’ should no longer prevail.”

What does Bukele say about China?

4. “En China actual hay millonarios en el Partido Comunista (PCCH). ¿Y cuál es el problema? China socialista ha implementado un modelo que la está sacando aceleradamente del subdesarrollo en que se encontraba y la está lanzando como una verdadera potencia. En Cuba hay una inmensa reforma en gestación.”

Translation: “In today’s China there are millionaires in the Communist Party (CCP). And what is the problem? Socialist China has implemented a model that is rapidly taking it out of the underdevelopment in which it found itself and is launching it as a true power. In Cuba there is an immense reform in gestation.”

The title of the article is also a direct quote from Bukele. Nayib Bukele: “Soy de izquierda radical” Translation: “I am a radical leftist.”

Last time I checked, radical leftism was not a conservative value.

Furthermore, why would CPAC host a self-proclaimed radical leftist as their keynote speaker? I have some suspicions based on what I learned in El Salvador which I will go into at a later date but the reasons are quite alarming.

“In today’s China there are millionaires in the Communist Party (CCP). And what is the problem? Socialist China has implemented a model that is rapidly taking it out of the underdevelopment in which it found itself and is launching it as a true power. In Cuba there is an immense reform in gestation.” – Nayib Bukele

I often talk in my live streams about the 7 signs of cognitive dissonance the political left slips into when you catch them supporting ideas that are counter to their belief systems or personal philosophies. I hope conservatives will resist that natural reaction and instead prove their claims during the covid years and during the expansion of neo-progressivism beginning in 2010, that their adherence to objective truth remains. The suspension of critical thinking by conservatives in favour of a political echo chamber like the Trudeau loyalists blinded to his authoritarianism, could be catastrophic and lead to alarming political instability over the long term. A leftist Latin American wannabe dictator is no path for conservatives or even classical liberals and libertarians who adhere to the values of freedom and objective truth.

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