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President JOE BIDEN is set to fly out Sunday for his first trip to Latin America since taking office. He’s heading to Mexico City for the “Three Amigos” Summit with Mexican President ANDRÉS MANUEL LÓPEZ OBRADOR and Canadian Prime Minister JUSTIN TRUDEAU.

On the way, he’ll make his first stop as president at the U.S. southern border in El Paso, Texas.

No doubt both trips will provide plenty of photo ops. But there also will be a full agenda on tap ranging from the border crisis, to trade and economic issues and climate and energy.

To help break it down, West Wing Playbook caught up with ROBERTA JACOBSON, Biden’s former border czar and the ambassador to Mexico under President BARACK OBAMA. This conversation has been edited for space.

Do you expect this trip to move the ball at all, or is it mainly symbolic? 

We have to acknowledge that it’s symbolic. But symbolism, to me, when done right leads to substance.

Biden is a president who believes deeply, and I’d say correctly, in the importance of personal diplomacy. In many significant ways, he and Trudeau are very much on the same page whether it’s on Russia-Ukraine or climate change or other things, but there are some tensions in the relationship with Mexico, even if they’re just on the rhetorical level at times. There’s certainly tensions in terms of trade disputes and the USMCA. And that’s where presidential conversations in person, and not on Zoom, not by your Cabinet secretaries, can really move the ball.

How would you describe the Biden-Obrador relationship? 

President Biden understands really well that this important relationship is critical to the United States economically and in security terms.

But there is always noise in this relationship. Noise because López Obrador might say something that is offensive to the United States, whether it’s about [Wikileaks founder] JULIAN ASSANGE or others. But Biden is very good — not always ignoring that noise because some of it can be important — but rising above it. So I think their relationship is actually better than it sometimes looks in AMLO’s press conferences.

What will you be watching for during the summit? 

To me, this is by far the most consequential “Three Amigos” summit because of what’s going on in the world.

I expect and hope that there’s going to be a focus on the competitiveness of North America. I think especially having passed the Inflation Reduction Act and the CHIPS Act in the U.S., working to take advantage of this potential for companies and investment to look toward North America is a very big opportunity.

Obviously, there will be discussion of migration issues, certainly among the U.S. and Mexico. And it will be also interesting to look at how they talk about as a whole, climate change and to a much lesser degree, energy. There’s a huge priority on climate change for both sides. Mexico has been lagging on this issue in some respects, but made very important commitments through COP 27.

So trade might be the biggest issue on the table? 

Things like migration and the action that the Mexicans took against [fentanyl trafficker] OVIDIO GUZMÁN in the last few days will be sexy and they’ll be top of mind for many of the media.

But to me, not even long term, but really short term as well, I’m looking at the competitiveness and trade issue. That could be the most consequential thing they try to move ahead on.

When it comes to the U.S.-Mexico relationship and migration policy, what is important for people to understand?

One thing that is sometimes lost in the migration debate is that both the composition of undocumented migrants, and the role of Mexico, has changed over recent months and years. The composition began in the Biden administration with the overwhelming number of migrants being from El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras, and that’s where the administration’s attention was focused in terms of response. Now there are many more migrants, as a percentage of the whole, from Nicaragua, Cuba, Venezuela. It has demanded a bit of a shift.

But the second thing is that over the last few years, Mexico has become not just a transit country, but a destination country for migrants. This has changed Mexico’s way of looking at migration … not only because of AMLO knowing they can’t necessarily always welcome everybody at infinitum, but public opinions have changed very dramatically in Mexico.

MEA CULPA: In Thursday’s edition, we (ok, let’s be real, Sam introduced the error into the copy) mistakenly referred to the U.S. Virgin Islands as an international travel destination. We apologize for the error (it’s a domestic destination — no passport required — although returning U.S. travelers do have to clear customs!). Thanks to all of you who emailed us about this.

MESSAGE US —Are you AMLO? We want to hear from you. And we’ll keep you anonymous! Email us at [email protected]

With help from the White House Historical Association

Testing your presidential pet knowledge with this one — which president received a golden retriever puppy named Liberty?

(Answer at the bottom.)

TGIF! It’s that time of the week when we feature a cartoon. This one is by BILL BRAMHALL. Our very own MATT WUERKER publishes a selection of cartoons from all over the country. View the cartoon carousel here.

IT’S BEEN TWO YEARS: During an event marking the two-year anniversary of the Jan. 6 insurrection, Biden Friday paid tribute to the heroism displayed by several first responders that day, and by others who acted courageously defending democracy, while also making clear that the circumstances leading to that day remain.

“All of it was fueled by lies about the 2020 election,” Biden said. “But on this day two years ago, our democracy held. We the People, as our Constitution refers to us, ‘We the people’ did not flinch.” Our JONATHAN LEMIRE has more from the event. 

AND HE'S EMH-OFF: Second gentleman DOUG EMHOFF will travel overseas later this month to Germany and Poland as part of his ongoing effort to address antisemitism in the U.S. and globally, Axios’s HANS NICHOLS reports. He and DEBORAH LIPSTADT, the U.S. special envoy to monitor and combat antisemitism, will visit the Auschwitz-Birkenau memorial in Poland on Jan. 27, International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

WHAT THE WHITE HOUSE WANTS YOU TO READ: THE DRUDGE REPORT! The conservative site put a full out splash this afternoon on the news that the U.S. unemployment rate had fallen to a pre-pandemic low of 3.5 percent. White House deputy comms director KATE BERNER tweeted out a full screen shot.

Earlier in the day, White House chief of staff RON KLAIN, who is living his best life this week, highlighted the jobs news in several different tweets:

WHAT THE WHITE HOUSE DOESN’T WANT YOU TO READ: That Covid-19 cases are spiking again. Our DANIEL PAYNE and DAN GOLDBERG report that “roughly 6,500 people in hospitals in the U.S. have tested positive for Covid-19, more than double the number from one month ago, and more than 10,000 people have died from Covid in the last month, the highest four-week total since the summer. The latest surge, likely worsened by holiday gatherings, comes as the number of vaccines administered hits a three-month lull despite ongoing pleas from public health officials.”

MEETINGS ON MEETINGS: Ahead of Japanese Prime Minister FUMIO KISHIDA’s visit to the White House Jan. 13, foreign and defense officials from the U.S. and Japan will hold security talks, AP’s MARI YAMAGUCHI reports.

FIRST IN WEST WING PLAYBOOK: ERICA SONGER has been named counsel to the vice president and special assistant to the president. Songer, an alum of Sen. CHRIS COONS (D-Del.), most recently served as senior counsel to the assistant attorney general for civil rights at the Department of Justice. Prior to that, Songer served as associate counsel and special assistant to the president in the White House Counsel’s Office.

— KELSEY SMITH is also joining the vice president’s office as director of scheduling and advance. She had previously worked in the office of Speaker NANCY PELOSI (D-Calif.) since 2012, most recently as director of schedule and advance and deputy director of protocol. She has also done advance work for a number of organizations and campaigns, including Hillary for America and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.

SULLIVAN’S TAKE: National Security Adviser JAKE SULLIVAN said he’s hopeful a war over Taiwan can be avoided, despite tension building between the U.S. and China. Sullivan said in an interview with NPR that “with responsible stewardship, we can ensure that this contingency never comes to pass. And that is our responsibility. It will require us following through on the commitments of the Taiwan Relations Act, which for 40 years now has said we will provide defensive articles to Taiwan. And it will require direct diplomacy with the [People's Republic of China].” More from NPR’s H.J. MAI.

SANCTIONS PILE UP: The Treasury Department imposed sanctions on “six executives and board members of U.S. designated Qods Aviation Industries” on Friday, penalizing Iranian officials connected to the drone program that supplied some of Russia’s drones in its invasion of Ukraine. CNN’s JENNIFER HANSLER has more.

Biden’s Blue Collar Bet (The Atlantic’s Ron Brownstein)

Military Investigation Reveals How the U.S. Botched a Drone Strike in Kabul (NYT’s Azmat Khan)

The US Keeps Offering China Its Covid Vaccines. China Keeps Saying No (Bloomberg’s Peter Martin and Jenny Leonard)

In the 1980’s, JOHN KERRY, Biden’s climate envoy, was on the receiving end of policy advice from actor MARLON BRANDO. The pair had a budding friendship, chatting via phone regularly.

“I had a telephone relationship with Marlon Brando. Back in '86, '85, when I was doing the contras,” Kerry told GQ in 2004. “He took a huge interest in it. And he would call me. He was always asking questions. And he'd give me advice.”

The pair never met in-person, but Kerry “gave [Brando] a chance to get out all his thoughts. I didn't want to abuse his privacy. You know, if he had said, ‘Hey, come on out and see me’ or ‘I'd like to see you,’ I'd have done it.”

So, did Brando’s backchanneling pay off? It seems so. Kerry said he “took his advice on a couple of angles. A couple of points.”

President GERALD FORD was gifted a puppy, Liberty, from DAVID HUME KENNERLY, his photographer. Later as a White House pet, Liberty gave birth to eight of her own puppies, one of which was donated to Leader Dogs for the Blind as a Seeing Eye Dog, according to the White House Historical Association.

A CALL OUT — Do you think you have a harder trivia question? Send us your best one about the presidents with a citation and we may feature it.

Edited by Eun Kyung Kim and Sam Stein.