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BumRushDaShow

(163,415 posts) Mon Nov 17, 2025, 07:22 PM 5 hrs ago

Ecuador rejects U.S. military bases in major defeat for President Noboa

Source: NPR

November 17, 2025 10:56 AM ET

GUAYAQUIL, Ecuador — Ecuadorians voted on Sunday to reject a package of referendum measures that would have allowed foreign military bases in the country. The result is seen as a sharp political setback for President Daniel Noboa, the 37-year-old conservative leader and close ally of U.S. President Donald Trump.

The proposal was heavily backed by Noboa as a crucial step to confront drug traffickers and violent gangs. Homicide rates in some Ecuadorian cities are amongst the world's highest, as local gangs, backed by international trafficking cartels fight for territory. The president says roughly 70% of global cocaine flows through the country. Even so, voters decisively opposed the plan.

Voters also rejected measures to cut public funding for political parties, create a constitutional assembly to rewrite the country's constitution and reduce the size of Congress. For many, the vote was a referendum on Noboa's leadership. Rosita Guichimillo, a 48-year-old Quito homemaker, said she feared the constitutional revisions would place too much power in the president's hands.

"If he rewrites the constitution, he'll do it to serve himself … and ruin the country even more," Guichimillo said as she voted in the Ecuadorian capital under light showers.

Read more: https://www.npr.org/2025/11/17/nx-s1-5610974/ecuador-referendum-u-s-military-bases-noboa

2 replies

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Ecuador rejects U.S. military bases in major defeat for President Noboa (Original Post) BumRushDaShow 5 hrs ago OP

Good!! MarineCombatEngineer 4 hrs ago #1

The people of South America and moniss 2 hrs ago #2

MarineCombatEngineer

(16,906 posts)

1. Good!!

Reply to BumRushDaShow (Original post)

Mon Nov 17, 2025, 08:28 PM

4 hrs ago

There's no fucking reason for US military bases in Ecuador, kudos to the Ecuadorian people for rejecting pedonald's wet dream.

moniss

(8,406 posts)

2. The people of South America and

Reply to MarineCombatEngineer (Reply #1)

Mon Nov 17, 2025, 10:32 PM

2 hrs ago

Central America have a very, very different perspective about the US government and military than what most people in the US think about ourselves. Rejecting these bases is a good thing in the long run because the bases would become a never ending springboard for pressure campaigns politically.

My critiques about media and wasted opportunities to inform are a constant with me. There are topics that big media just will never really get into except on a superficial level. Our history of f'ng around with the countries in South America is one of those topics. Once in a great while someone will do something small about El Salvador or Nicaragua but not much else. Even with Kissinger in Chile most of that story is still not covered except in passing.

Put simply when we hear about the death squads, repression and torture the US has been a co-conspirator, supplier and strategist for these actions for many, many decades propping up the wealthy corporations, landowners and right wing militias enforcing the subjugation of people. Ken Burns could do a whole season on South America alone and then 2 more on Central America and the Caribbean.

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