We want to overcome our historical problems with Chile. The sea has divided us and the sea must bring us back together again. Chile has agreed, for the first time, to talk about sea access for Bolivia.

For this reason García related that:
The MAS is in no sense seeking to form a socialist government. What I do as a Marxist is evaluate the actual potential for development in society. In 1982 the leftist Hernán Siles Zuazo and the Democratic and Popular Union (Unidad Democrática y Popular - UDP) took power in representative democratic elections before bowing to U.

Politically a democratic socialist he leads the Movement for Socialism party (MAS) and the Cocalero trade union. Growing coca he joined the cocalero trade union rising to prominence in the campesino (rural laborers) union campaigning against the United States and Bolivian government's attempts to eradicate coca as a part of the War on Drugs. Gaining increasing visibility through the gas conflict and the Cochabamba protests of 2000 in 2002 he was expelled from Congress though came second in that year's presidential election.