President-elect Donald Trump has appointed Mauricio Claver-Carone as the next US State Department Special Envoy for Latin America.
Claver-Carone was a U.S. Treasury and National Security Council senior official in President Trump’s administration and president of the Inter-American Development Bank from 2020-22.
Trump announced Claver-Carone’s selection will help “put America’s interests FIRST” in a time when “chaos and anarchy have engulfed” Latin America, adding that “it is time to restore order in our own hemisphere.”
Claver-Carone has advocated for a US LATAM foreign policy focused on fostering the Americas' economic development and democratic regeneration.
Measures supported by Claver-Carone include expanded trade agreements between the US and LATAM countries as well as US investments in LATAM energy and infrastructure.
“It’s beyond time for U.S. agencies, together with U.S. investors, to aggressively pursue the capital-intensive, high-quality deals that abound throughout the region, without any self-imposed hindrances, so that together we can Make the Americas Grow Again,” wrote Claver-Carone.
Claver-Carone was an avid proponent of Trump’s ‘America Crece,’ an energy and infrastructure investment program for LATAM partly designed to compete with China’s investments in the region.
President Joe Biden halted America Crece, but it could be revived or rebranded in Trump's administration.
China’s influence and the democratic decline the region is experiencing have incited conservatives and Trump allies to criticize President Biden’s LATAM foreign policy and demand a reorientation.
As Claver-Carone has similarly underscored, Republicans have argued for increased US involvement in the region via economic and political alliances with friendly democratic states and repressive measures against autocratic regimes.
Trump’s appointment of Claver-Carone, which follows that of former Senator Marco Rubio to lead the State Department, forecasts a change in US LATAM foreign policy closer to Republican desires.
Claver-Carone will presumably need to be confirmed by the Senate but could begin working in a temporary fashion as soon as Trump is inaugurated.
