The preparation is worthwhile. Deloitte, a consultancy, estimates that the tournament will add $2.73bn to Mexico’s economy, about 0.14% of annual GDP, and generate more than 100,000 temporary jobs. For the weakest economy among the host countries, the World Cup also offers Mexico a rare chance to present itself as safer, richer and more modern than many outsiders assume. But it also carries political risk. For months Mr Trump has insisted that Mexico is not doing enough to fight the gangsters operating on its territory or their drug-trafficking into the United States. He has designated several Mexican gangs as “terrorist” organisations and has repeatedly suggested that he might take direct military action against them. Relations with Ms Sheinbaum have become more strained as Mr Trump has adopted an increasingly unilateral approach. Tension increased recently after two American officials, widely reported to be CIA officers, died in a car crash on April 19th after an anti-drug operation in the northern state of Chihuahua. Ms Sheinbaum subsequently warned the United States not to conduct unauthorised operations on Mexican soil. On April 30th American prosecutors charged Rubén Rocha Moya, the governor of neighbouring Sinaloa and a member of Ms Sheinbaum’s Morena party, with helping the Sinaloa cartel to move drugs into the United States in exchange for money and political support. American authorities have reportedly revoked the visas of two other governors who are Morena members. Mexico’s 13 matches will run over the next month; the last one will be in Mexico City on July 5th. Any foul-ups—whether because of organised crime, a drone, a protest, a border dispute or a transport failure—will not be judged in isolation. The worry is that they will become grist for Mr Trump’s argument that Mexico cannot control its own territory. For Ms Sheinbaum that, not drug gangs, is the World Cup’s biggest risk. ■ Sign up to El Boletín, our subscriber-only newsletter on Latin America, to understand the forces shaping a fascinating and complex region. This article was downloaded by zlibrary from https://www.economist.com//the-americas/2026/06/07/the-world-cup-will-test-mexicos- control-over-its-territory
What happens when a presidential vote is a dead heat? Peru, looking for its ninth president in a decade, is in a tight spot June 11th 2026 Peru often marches to a different beat from the rest of South America. When its neighbours were run by right-wing military dictatorships in the 1960s and 1970s, a leftist general was in charge in Lima. In the 1990s, Peru veered into electoral authoritarianism while others were consolidating democracy. It first elected a left-wing leader long after the “Pink Tide” of the early 2000s— which saw leftists win power across Latin America—had crested. This year, Peru might at last fall into sync with the rest of the region. After Argentina, Ecuador, Chile and Bolivia turned right, political analysts asked if Peru would be added to the list of countries with Trump-aligned leaders. Conditions seemed ideal. The left had been discredited by the hapless
presidency of Pedro Castillo, while an explosion of gang violence had made law and order the most pressing issue for voters. Peruvians voted in a run-off between right-wing Keiko Fujimori and the left-wing Roberto Sánchez on June 7th. Ms Fujimori, on her fourth straight run for the presidency, led opinion polls for most of the campaign. In the final stretch, though, Mr Sánchez tacked to the centre and closed the gap. The votes are split nearly evenly between the two. At first Mr Sánchez held a slim lead. But on June 11th, as The Economist went to press, with 98% of the vote counted, Ms Fujimori had slipped ahead by just 651 votes out of 18m. She pulled ahead as ballots came in from abroad, which broke for her disproportionately. The betting platform Polymarket gave her a 97% chance of victory. Neither candidate is popular. Ms Fujimori is best known as the eldest daughter and political heir of Alberto Fujimori, an autocrat who oversaw human-rights abuses while in government between 1990 and 2000. Mr Sánchez, meanwhile, centred his campaign on pardoning Mr Castillo, who was convicted last year for attempting to close down Congress and rule by decree in 2022. While their core supporters propelled them to the run-off, more Peruvians cast blank or spoiled ballots in the first-round than voted for either candidate. Ahead of the run-off, voters struggled to assess who would do the least damage. One podcast dedicated an episode to the question “Who is more of a coup-monger?” Some voters bought dollars ahead of the vote. Despite frequent bouts of political upheaval, Peru’s mining-powered economy has remained stable largely thanks to high copper and gold prices and investor- friendly policies enshrined in the constitution, which Mr Sánchez wants to replace. If she does win, Ms Fujimori will lack the mandate enjoyed by her father and the region’s more populist leaders, who beat their rivals with the support of millions. Peru’s next president will take office with a margin of victory so small that all of its voters could fit in a football stadium. Her party is also expected to wield less power in the next Congress—sufficient to shield her from impeachment but not to pass ambitious reforms.
Recounts and legal wrangling could easily drag on into July. Fortunately, Peruvians have learned to shrug off political uncertainty. Three of the four tightest presidential elections in Peru’s history took place in the past decade, according to an electoral expert, Fernando Tuesta. Ms Fujimori lost the last two by a quarter of a percentage point. After her 2016 defeat, she embraced the role of opposition leader with zeal, using her party’s congressional power to chuck out four out of the next eight presidents. “I don’t even remember our current president’s name. Velasco? Balazar?” says Hernán Santos, a taxi driver in Lima. (The answer: Balcázar.) Ms Fujimori’s persistence has forced Peruvians to rehash debates about her political dynasty. Many headed to the polls with the enthusiasm of the protagonist in “Groundhog Day”. “I hope I live long enough to see an election without Keiko,” says Victoria Ramos, a 55-year-old newspaper vendor who nonetheless voted for her hoping she would rein in crime. “I want her to be like her father and bring order.” While Ms Fujimori promised military-run mega-prisons and deportation of immigrant criminals, Mr Sánchez cast a “corrupt-mafia pact” as the ultimate source of chaos, claiming that laws which Ms Fujimori’s party helped to pass had weakened the fight against organised crime. Speaking to The Economist, he suggested that Donald Trump did not endorse Ms Fujimori because the Americans “did their homework. They know very well that this level of instability is unforgivable and who’s responsible.” While he accused Ms Fujimori of seeking impunity for her friends, Mr Sánchez excused Mr Castillo’s 2022 power grab as a “politically understandable” act of desperation. He claims that he would not follow the same path if elected and obstructed by Congress. Instead, he would insist on dialogue, encouraging protests if needed. Ms Fujimori is already a magnet for protests across southern Peru, where voters blame her for propping up an interim president whose crackdown killed 49 civilians. If elected, she could struggle to contain her detractors while making good on a “reservoir of promises from four campaigns”, says Mr Tuesta, the analyst. “If she can’t deliver quickly, the streets will mobilise.” ■
Correction (June 10th): A previous version of this article slightly understated Ms Fujimori‘s margin of defeat in the past two elections. Sign up to El Boletín, our subscriber-only newsletter on Latin America, to understand the forces shaping a fascinating and complex region. This article was downloaded by zlibrary from https://www.economist.com//the-americas/2026/06/09/what-happens-when-a- presidential-vote-is-a-dead-heat
Techno-libertarians are flocking to the Caribbean Angry locals are trying to shut them down June 11th 2026 THE ISLAND of Nevis, a sleepy speck in the eastern Caribbean, is up in arms. Last year Olivier Janssens, a Belgian crypto billionaire who acquired local citizenship through investment, surprised his 13,000 fellow islanders by declaring the construction of a huge, futuristic enclave. If approved, the “Destiny” project will span a tenth of the island and accommodate 10,000 new residents with their own currency and courts. It would be the “Monaco- Dubai of the Caribbean”, according to Mr Janssens. Locals are outraged. “You’ve got to be crazy,” says Glendale Herbert of the Nevis community foundation. The Caribbean has become a mecca for libertarian enclaves over the past decade. A constellation of so-called special jurisdictions rings the basin,
from charter cities to blockchain-based collectives. “This is where the most daring experiments are taking place,” says Vera Kichanova of the Free Cities Foundation, an American think-tank. Their promoters are typically Western eccentrics and tech bros fleeing red tape and “woke” politicians. Such ventures have a troubled history. In the late 20th century a string of American businessmen tried to establish nations in the Caribbean. In the 1970s a New York skin-care magnate launched “Operation Atlantis”, towing a cement-iron boat to the Bahamas and declaring independence. It quickly sank. In the 1980s a fugitive Wall Street fraudster thought he might escape justice by buying half of Barbuda and turning it into an independent principality. In 1999 a grifter from Arizona proclaimed ownership of a submerged atoll off the Cayman Islands and named it New Utopia. Newer projects are less fanciful. Most are “special-lifestyle zones”, says Ms Kichanova. CryptoCity, a private town being built on the Venezuelan island of Margarita, is primarily residential. The “Veritas Villages” being set up by a Canadian entrepreneur in Nicaragua, Panama and Costa Rica are resorts with odd branding. After failing to forge an anti-statist collective on a Bitcoin-funded cruise liner, seasteaders in Panama now plan to build floating homes called SeaPods. A project called Próspera is an exception. Established on the Honduran island of Roatán in 2017, its American founders have used a loose tax and regulatory framework to attract fintech, biotech and robotics startups. It is backed by venture capitalists including Peter Thiel and Marc Andreessen as well as Sam Altman, the boss of OpenAI. Labs there run trials outside American regulatory purview, including treatments for Alzheimer’s and cancer, weight-loss drugs and neural implants. The enclave has its own legal system, called Ulex, which allows firms to choose the regulations which apply to them. Proponents argue that these projects help locals by boosting employment and competing with shoddy elected governments. Most sit on fallow land and produce their own energy from renewables. Some opponents weaken their case by being alarmist—a common claim is that zones harbour sex- trafficking rings. Others seem nostalgic. “People are flailing against the idea