“He had a great working relationship with the U.S. Embassy. For some people, that’s like treason.”

Sebastian Rotella, ProPublica, and Foreign Policy have a fascinating story about a reformer, Enrique Degenhart, in Guatemala's immigration services.

After taking the job of director of the notoriously corrupt agency in 2010, he had beefed up internal affairs, modernized technology, and battled criminal networks that sold fraudulent passports to African migrants, Russian fugitives, and Colombian drug traffickers. His reforms had won him a long list of powerful enemies — inside and outside the government — linked to mafias.

So what happened? The US government tells the incoming Perez Molina government to keep Degenhart and Paz y Paz. They are the good guys in trying to turn things around in Guatemala. Instead, Perez Molina and Baldetti fire Degenhart and remove all his protections. He would be in the way of their efforts to plunder the state at its ports of entry. (Paz y Paz is obviously removed before her term is complete.)

Degenhart barely survives an assassination attempt in 2012. He is shot several times during an ambush in Guatemala City. While the MP's office and CICIG are unable to solve who ordered the attempt on his life, many of those suspected of being involved were arrested in 2013, 2014, and 2015 (union leaders, customs employees, businessmen who do passport/customs work, perhaps the VP and Pres).

After finding safety and employment in the US, Degenhart returned to Guatemala to continue the good fight. Rotella tells great stories and this is another one.

In October, newcomer Jimmy Morales won the presidency on a wave of voter disgust with traditional politics. Although President Morales ran on an anti-corruption platform and promised to support the U.N. prosecutor, critics worry that his political movement includes military veterans from the country’s dark past.

Degenhart shares those concerns. But he said the new government has also taken encouraging steps, appointing reform-minded law enforcement officials whom he respects. The danger appears to be receding, he said.

The developments of the last few years have been nothing short of remarkable. I understand that fewer homicides, a strengthened judiciary, and a ton of arrests and successful prosecutions have not noticeably improved the day-to-day lives of most Guatemalans. However, I am somewhat hopeful that in spite of obstruction from the executive and legislative branches and many in the private sector, that there is greater hope for a turnaround in Guatemala than there has been in sometime, more so than in neighboring Honduras, El Salvador, and Mexico.