Secretary of State Marco Rubio will visit Panama on his first trip abroad as the top U.S. diplomat after President Donald Trump’s calls to seize the country’s canal, three unnamed officials told Politico on Wednesday.
The trip, which is scheduled from late January into early February, also includes stops in El Salvador, Guatemala, Costa Rica and the Dominican Republic, according to the outlet. The plans are reportedly tentative.
“We won’t continue to ignore the region as other administrations have,” Tammy Bruce, a spokeswoman for the State Department said on Wednesday, the outlet reported. “Engaging with our neighbors is a vital element in addressing migration, supply chains and economic growth, which are key to Secretary Rubio’s pursuit of foreign policy focused on making America strong, prosperous, and safe.”
Bruce added that Rubio chose to prioritize the Western Hemisphere first because “it’s where we live.”
Rubio is expected to visit the country in an attempt to advance two of the president’s key campaign promises: curtailing illegal migration through Central America to the U.S. southern border and reasserting American control over the Panama Canal, officials told the outlet.
“The Panama Canal belongs to Panama and will continue to belong to Panama,” Panamanian President José Raúl Mulino said at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Wednesday. “The Panama Canal is not a concession or a gift from the United States.”
“We gave it to Panama, and we’re taking it back,” Trump said during his inaugural address, characterizing former President Jimmy Carter’s treaty ceding the canal to Panama as a “foolish gift.” Trump also expressed concern over Chinese management of the certain ports along the canal.
China has expanded its footprint in the canal significantly over recent years, with the China-based Landbridge Group acquiring control over Margarita Island — home to Panama’s largest Atlantic port — in 2016. Additionally, the Panamanian government renewed in 2021 the lease of Hong Kong-based Hutchison Ports PPC, which operates the ports of Balboa and Cristobal, two major trade hubs in the canal’s Pacific and Atlantic outlets, respectively.
During his Senate confirmation hearing, Rubio warned that Chinese companies would have no choice but to “shut [a port] down and impede our transit,” should China order them to do so, noting that there are no “independent” Chinese companies.
U.S. critics say that China’s increasing presence in the area endangers the neutrality of the canal, one of the stipulations in Carter’s treaty.
Carter signed a treaty in 1977 to gradually cede the Panama Canal, which the U.S. constructed under President Theodore Roosevelt, to its host country. The treaty also mandated that all U.S. military bases in Panama be transferred to Panamanian control, drastically reducing the American presence along the strategically important waterway.
The president has also called for the U.S. to assert control over Canada and the Danish territory of Greenland.
The Senate unanimously confirmed Rubio as secretary of state Monday with a vote of 99-0.
The State Department did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.
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