Countries like Ecuador, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Costa Rica experienced notable economic growth during this period whilst Bolivia and El Salvador both saw a notable reduction in poverty according to the World Bank. Economic hardships occurred in countries such as Argentina, Brazil and Venezuela as oil and commodity prices declined and according to analysts because of their unsustainable policies. In regard to the economic situation, President of Inter-American Dialogue Michael Shifter stated: "The United States–Cuban Thaw occurred with Cuba reapproaching the United States when Cuba's main international partner, Venezuela, began experiencing economic hardships". Following the initiation of the pink tide's policies, the relationship between both left-leaning and right-leaning governments and the public changed. As leftist governments took power in the region, rising commodity prices funded their welfare policies, which lowered inequality and assisted indigenous rights. The overspending of leftist governments in the 2000s resulted in the election of more liberal governments in the 2010s by citizens in the region seeking a sustainable economy, which required potential progressive politicians to reevaluate their policies. However, such advancements changed the location of Latin America's center of the political spectrum, forcing right-wing candidates and succeeding governments to adopt more socially-conscious administrations. Under the Obama admininstration, which held a less interventionist approach to the region after recognizing that interference would only boost the popularity of populist pink tide leaders like Chávez, Latin American approval of the United States began to improve as well. By the mid-2010s, "negative views of China were widespread" due to the substandard conditions of Chinese goods, unjust professional actions, cultural differences, damage to the Latin American environment and perceptions of Chinese interventionism. During 2018 and 2019, two new countries entered the Pink Tide, Mexico with the electoral victory of Andrés Manuel López Obrador in the 2018 Mexican general election and Laurentino Cortizo in the 2019 Panamanian general election, whilst incumbent right-wing president Mauricio Macri of Argentina lost against left-wing Peronista Alberto Fernández alongside Cristina Fernández de Kirchner as running mate in the 2019 Argentine general election and in Colombia the ruling right-wing party of President Iván Duque and Alvaro Uribe faced a notorious defeat at the 2019 regional elections. A series of very violent protest against austerity measures and income inequality scattered throughout Latin America including the 2019 Chilean protests, 2018–19 Haitian protests and the 2019 Ecuadorian protests, whilst in Honduras, anti-government protest requesting the resignation of Juan Orlando Hernández for the accusations of narcotics connections against him also spread.