Payment to Mexican president's brother raises hackles

Video of a man giving a packet of cash to a brother of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has raised hackles in Mexico

MEXICO CITY -- Video of a man giving a packet of cash to a brother of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador had the president — who has made the fight against corruption his signature issue — on the defensive on Friday, vowing that there would be no coverup. The image first reported by journalist Carlos Loret de Mola shows David León handing the equivalent of $7,500 to Martín Jesús López Obrador in 2015 — some three years before the president was elected. León is heard saying on the video that the cash was from “my savings” and telling the president’s brother, “I’ll make a note of it,” to which Martín Jesús López Obrador replies “No, buddy. We’ll write that off.” Léon, who served as head of the federal civil defense office in 2018 and 2019, later wrote in his Twitter account that “the money mentioned there was part of my personal savings and it was a loan.”