New York Foreign Press Center Briefing on U.S. Priorities in the Western Hemisphere

MODERATOR: So let’s get started. Welcome, everyone. Good morning. I’d like to take a moment to welcome the Assistant Secretary for Western Hemisphere Affairs Brian A. Nichols back to the New York Foreign Press Center. He leads the bureau’s 2,700 employees at 29 embassies and 23 consulates general, and 14 domestic offices. He is responsible for an operational budget of 560 million and a foreign assistance budget of 2.1 billion. Assistant Secretary Nichols directs all American foreign policy, personnel, and programs in the Western Hemisphere Affairs. He holds a personal rank of a career ambassador and the highest rank in the U.S. Foreign Service. It’s a pleasure to welcome everyone. My name is Daphne Stavropoulos, and I’m today’s moderator. Today’s briefing is on the record, and a transcript will be provided later this afternoon. Assistant Secretary Nichols will cover U.S. priorities in the Western Hemisphere this morning. After his remarks, we’ll open it to questions in the room, and then those of journalists who have joined us on Zoom. Thank you again, and welcome. ASSISTANT SECRETARY NICHOLS: Thank you very much, Daphne, and it’s great to be back in New York. And it’s an honor to be with you and think a little bit about the time that I’ve had as assistant secretary for Western Hemisphere Affairs. I think we’ve made an immense amount of progress, of which I am proud. And I want to take this opportunity to both answer your questions and to highlight some of the successes that we’ve had over the last four years. We’ve really focused on harnessing our diplomatic tools to build partnerships to deliver results that advance American core interests, and the core interests of our partners and allies around the hemisphere. Our partnerships helped ensure a peaceful democratic transition in Guatemala, and they prevented Haiti from collapsing. They’ve helped secure the release of more than 350 political prisoners in Nicaragua, and buoyed the democratic aspirations of the Venezuelan people. Our partnership with Mexico has secured key achievements on security and migration, at the same time that Mexico became the United States’s largest trading partner. This spirit has elevated our relationship with emerging powers like Guyana, enhanced cooperation to address historic levels of displacement, irregular migration, and boosted economic competitiveness throughout the Americas. Let me talk about some of these in greater detail. In 2023, in Guatemala, we stood firmly in support of democratic principles and the rule of law. When anti-democratic actors brazenly attempted to hold onto power in Guatemela, the United States worked with the Guatemalan and international partners to help the Guatemalan people secure their country’s democratic future. In tandem with private sector leaders, indigenous groups, and others, we achieved our shared goal of protecting democracy and promoting respect for human rights. We coordinated targeted sanctions with Canada and the European Union, and brokered resolutions at the Organization of American States to spotlight the outgoing government’s corrupt actions. This U.S.-led partnership stuck together to ensure a peaceful transmission to a government that now seeks closer relations and burden sharing with the United States. Guatemala is supportive on migration – Haiti, Venezuela, and Taiwan – and welcomed 135 Nicaraguan former political prisoners in September after the United States secured their release. Nowhere has our focus on custom-built partnerships proved more essential than in Haiti, where an ongoing security and humanitarian crisis has claimed thousands of lives and threatened regional security. We supported the Haitian National Police as it bravely fended off gang attacks. We empowered Kenya to lead a Multinational Security Support mission in Haiti. We’ve leveraged multilateral meetings to spotlight the crisis, and raised more than $100 million in partner country pledges and provided equipment and personnel from Kenya, Jamaica, Guatemala, and other countries. And we are working with El Salvador and the Dominican Republic to provide medical evacuation teams, and the Bahamas on maritime security. While Haiti still has a very long way to go in restoring security and democratic governance, the efforts of the Haitian National Police, the Multinational Security Support mission, our key CARICOM partners, and others have kept the country from collapse. Our commitment to the Venezuelan people has also been unwavering. We have leveraged our partnerships to create space for the Venezuelan people to express their desire for democratic change. This included our support for the opposition’s efforts to induce Maduro through the Barbados Agreement to hold the July 28th election, and again after Venezuelans braved intimidation to turn out to the polls and support President-elect Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia. The United States united more than 50 countries to press the Maduro side to release full results and cease citizen repression. Faced with historic levels of displacement and irregular migration across the hemisphere, the United States moved to create the first ever regional diplomatic partnership focused on migration. Launched at the U.S.-hosted Summit of the Americas in June 2022, the Los Angeles Declaration on Migration and Protection brings together 22 countries to promote a common vision for safe, orderly, humane, regular migration. Cooperation with our Los Angeles Declaration partners enhances humane migration management, promotes integration, strengthens refugee protection, and creates lawful pathways for migrants throughout the region. The United States is the leading humanitarian donor for Venezuelan, Nicaraguan, and other refugees and vulnerable migrants across the region. Moreover, this administration’s efforts to address the drivers of migration and displacement from northern Central America reduced southwest border encounters from that sub-region by 50 percent over the past three years. Our Root Causes Strategy has been instrumental in addressing the underlying factors driving migration and displacement from Central America. Significant U.S. investment and engagement in each of the five pillars of the U.S. Strategy for Addressing the Root Causes of Migration in Central America – economic opportunities, good governance, insecurity, human rights, and gender-based violence – resulted in tangible economic security and democratic gains in the region. I should note that arrivals to our southwest border are at the lowest level since they’ve been – since 2020, July of 2020. A cornerstone of the strategy is Central America Forward, a public-private partnership that, since launching in 2023, has galvanized more than $5.2 billion in private sector commitments and brought 2.5 million people into the formal economy and trained over 1 million people. It’s created more than 90,000 new quality jobs. Promoting inclusive economic prosperity has been at the heart of our efforts. Through initiatives like the Americas Partnership for Economic Prosperity, the North American Leaders Summit, and bilateral economic dialogues with Mexico, Brazil, Chile, and other countries, we have sought to create opportunities for all individuals, particularly members of marginalized communities. Our focus has been on fostering innovation, improving infrastructure, and enhancing trade relationships to drive sustainable growth across the region. The strategic elevation of our relationship with Guyana, the fastest-growing economy in the world, provides further proof that these partnerships produce results. Our interagency partners at U.S. Southern Command strengthened bilateral defense cooperation through medical missions, flood relief operations, joint training exercises, and military equipment transfers. We also partnered with U.S. companies, which invested more than $15 billion in Guyana between 2021 and 2024. In November, the U.S. Export-Import Bank gave initial approval for a $500 million loan guarantee to support a $2 billion U.S.-built gas to energy project that represents the largest foreign investment in Guyana’s history. And we expanded our partnership with leaders at the local level by hosting the inaugural Cities Summit of the Americas in Denver in April 2023, bringing together key leaders to discuss how they can tackle our greatest shared global challenges at the local level. Partnership is power. Effective partnerships are enabled by diplomacy and mutual respect. I’m extremely proud of what we have accomplished during my tenure, and I know that active diplomacy will remain an essential tool to advance our core U.S. interests. Thanks very much and happy to take any questions that you have. MODERATOR: Thank you so much, sir. If you have a question, please raise your hand and identify yourself by name and outlet. We’ll go first to Alejandro. QUESTION: Right. Assistant Secretary Nichols, thank you so much for doing this briefing. I’m Alejandro Rincón with NTN24, international news channel. Our follow-up questions is on the situation in Venezuela. There has been growing concern about the situation on the Argentinian embassy in Caracas over the weekend. There has been increasing reports on pretty much a siege by the Maduro regime against this embassy that is currently under the protection of Brazil, and there is a growing uncertainty as to what’s going to happen to those political opposition members that are still inside of the embassy, whether or not they’re going to be given a safe passage. So can you give us a little bit more of your reaction, your comments on the situation in that embassy, please? ASSISTANT SECRETARY NICHOLS: Well, thank you for that question. We are deeply concerned about the situation there. We call upon the Maduro authorities to respect the inviolability of the residents of Argentina, which is under the protection of Brazil. We call upon the Maduro side to release all of their political prisoners and to allow safe conduct for those who are inside the Argentine embassy to be able to leave the embassy and, if they wish, to be able to leave the country. Argentina and Brazil and countries across our hemisphere and across the world have denounced the harassment that political actors have suffered in Venezuela since the election on July 28th. We believe that it’s essential that Venezuelans be able to express their views and their political preferences without reprisals or repercussions, and I know that the bravery and the commitment to democracy that millions of Venezuelans have shown is an example for people around the world and that the world stands with them. And we’ll continue to call for transparency and a return to democracy in Venezuela. QUESTION: Thank you very much for your very enlightened comments. I have – my name is Manik Mehta. I’m a syndicated journalist. I’m – we have been reading a lot about migrants waiting at the Mexican border and anxious to come into the U.S. Could you give us an update on that? And also, there’s – the influx that came here already, what is the government doing about them? ASSISTANT SECRETARY NICHOLS: So – well, first of all, I would encourage only those persons who have a legal right to be in the United States should be attempting to enter the United States. Those people who believe that they have a well-founded fear of persecution can apply for asylum. However, I would note that countries also have a obligation to grant asylum in the first country where the migrant presents themselves. So in the cases of people at our southwest border, they’ve typically transited other countries and should be seeking to avail themselves of protections in those other countries before they get to the United States. The number of arrivals at the United States southern border, as I said, is at its lowest level since the previous administration in 2020. This reflects both our cooperation with partner nations around the hemisphere to provide other alternatives for migrants in different parts of the region, including options for residency and other legal pathways. But it also reflects our enhanced enforcement efforts and our aggressive use of repatriation for those who do not have a legal right to be in the United States. The Biden administration continues to focus on promoting safe, orderly, humane migration, but also on enforcing our laws for those people who do not have a legal right to remain in the United States. MODERATOR: Thank you very much. Go ahead. QUESTION: Hi. I’m Daisuke Nakai, Asahi Shimbun, Japan. Thank you very much for doing this briefing today. I’d like to ask a follow-up on the question of migration. What are your thoughts on what the domestic impact of the past four years of influx of migrants has been? And as you mentioned, the United States does maintain the right for people to claim for asylum if they have a well-founded basis, but that does not always seem to be completely understood by the domestic population. What are your thoughts on how the system is right now? ASSISTANT SECRETARY NICHOLS: Well, this administration has prioritized, as I said, through the Los Angeles Declaration on Migration and Protection finding ways to promote safe, orderly migration and, at the same time, to dismantle those networks that would promote trafficking in persons or people smuggling. We’ve worked to warn charter companies and sanction them if they are participating in transport of people who they should know are intended irregular migrants. And we’ve shut down corridors of migration from various different parts of the world, many of them flowing through Nicaragua, but also through other places in our hemisphere. We’ve worked with partner nations to dismantle smuggling networks to train migration and law enforcement personnel. We’ve increased the protection resources in our region so that those people who are vulnerable migrants can receive the resources and the protection that they have. We’ve provided a focus through international partners, like the International Organization for Migration and the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, on the full breadth of resources that can be deployed to support migration in an orderly, managed way. There are over 100 – well over 100 million migrants on the move globally, and a significant portion of those are in the Western Hemisphere. Within our hemisphere, over the course of the last few years, a majority of those migrants have been from Venezuela, but also from places like Cuba, Nicaragua, and Haiti – all places where democracy is under extreme strain or does not exist. We’ve tried to focus on addressing the root causes of migration, not only though our Root Causes Strategy in Central America, which I talked about before, but also by working to address the threats that democracy faces in other parts of our hemisphere. This issue is a crucial issue for not just American citizens but for people around the hemisphere. It can be lost sometimes I think on our domestic public in the United States that this is a crucial political issue not just in the United States but across the hemisphere. This is a major issue in the politics in Peru, in Ecuador, in Colombia, Chile, in Uruguay, in Argentina, in Brazil. Name a country, it is an issue. So – in the Bahamas, in Trinidad and Tobago. Everyone is trying to manage this issue. These are global trends, and I think that this administration has managed them in a humane, creative, and lawful way. And let’s remember that this administration put forward a comprehensive, bipartisan – comprehensive immigration reform law, which was not taken up by the Congress. And because of that, the legal changes to do things like provide additional resources for border enforcement or for the asylum law process to go forward were not enacted. So that was a significant limitation on what we could do, absent a new legal framework. MODERATOR: Thank you. Let’s go online, and we can return to the room. The first question I see is Juan. Juan, could you enable your microphone, as well as perhaps your video? QUESTION: Thank you so much. Mr. Nichols, Juan from W Radio Colombia. I would like to know first about the relationship between U.S. and Colombia, if we could have, like, an assessment of the current state of that relationship – so important for the United States and for Colombia, but especially in light of discussions about the potential reductions being made for issues like antinarcotics efforts next year. Could that happen? Thank you so much, Mr. Nichols. ASSISTANT SECRETARY NICHOLS: Well, Colombia and the United States have a partnership that goes back generations. We fought side by side with Colombian forces in Korea and World War II. Colombia is a major trading partner for the United States and vice versa. And we have deep and longstanding regard for Colombia and its people. We have to work together to address a whole host of challenges, whether it’s climate change or transnational organized crime or narcotics trafficking. Those are key areas for our collaboration. The United States is the largest contributor to the implementation of the 2016 peace accord between the Colombian Government and the FARC, and we’re proud to sponsor the ethnic chapter of that accord, among other things. We believe that cooperation between our two countries to address these types of challenges like narcotics trafficking, transnational organized crime, will need to continue and remain a priority, regardless of who’s governing either of our nations. There are longstanding goals that go back decades. I don’t imagine that that will change. But I think that, as we go forward, you’re going to see continued intense engagement between our governments and our countries to make the lives of both of our peoples better. MODERATOR: Thank you. I see that, Mario, you have your hand raised. Please enable your audio and your video and go ahead. QUESTION: Hello. Thank you for this meeting. (In Spanish.) MODERATOR: Sir, can you also repeat your question in English for our transcript? QUESTION: Okay, I’m sorry. Tomorrow mark 10 years since the restoration of relations between the Cuban regime and the United States. How do you evaluate this relationship and your work in the past four year? ASSISTANT SECRETARY NICHOLS: (In Spanish.) QUESTION: Thank you so much. MODERATOR: Thank you. We’ll go back to the room. QUESTION: Thank you very much for doing this. I am Bernhard Zand with Der Spiegel, the German news magazine. When you just listed the number of countries for which migration is a big issue, I couldn’t help as a former China bureau chief to think that China is also an issue for all of these countries. If you look back on your four years in the – or this administration’s diplomatic posture in Latin America, how does it compare to China’s diplomatic efforts in the Western Hemisphere? ASSISANT SECRETARY NICHOLS: That’s a great question and I’m very glad that you asked that. If you look at popular opinion throughout the hemisphere, the publics in this region admire the United States more and in almost every case as the top country that they – foreign country that they admire. When you ask publics in this region should their country improve or focus on relations with the United States or a whole host of competitors, including the People’s Republic of China, they say that they should focus on improving relations with the United States. When you look at the solutions that we are delivering to our partners in this region, you see that they are meeting the needs of the peoples of the region and you see greater and greater disappointment with the offerings that the PRC has delivered in the past, which have meant increases in debt to countries in the region, poor quality projects, and right now as we’re seeing just on a global level that according to multilateral financial institutions, right now China is a net recipient of debt inflows to them because they’re collecting more money than they’re pushing out in assistance. It’s the United States that’s providing both trade and investment opportunities but also development assistance to countries in a dramatic way that the PRC does not. When we look at our partner nations like Costa Rica, which has been the subject of hacking attacks in the – over the course of the past couple years, the United States has worked with them to fend off those attacks and help strengthen their digital infrastructure as part of our efforts around the region to promote responsible use of critical minerals. We have a number of initiatives aimed at that. Those help mineral-producing countries get the best value and the best opportunity for their mineral exports. We’ve worked to promote high-value jobs in partner nations like Brazil, for example. You look at our relationship economically with Brazil, two-thirds of the economic activity of Brazil is driven by American Chamber of Commerce companies, and the best high-paying jobs in that country are ones tied to the service sector, where the United States is the leading trading partner of Brazil. When you talk about values in our region, people recognize that the United States espouses the kinds of values that are important for them and their families. We’ve been leaders from the time of the COVID-19 pandemic in delivering improved health care in the region through vaccines, through training of health care workers, which is something that was laid out as one of our objectives in the Summit of the Americas in 2022. We’ve been leaders in helping people join the digital economy, and we’re providing the kinds of solutions that average people want. We’ve also been working hard to combat the disinformation that comes from Russia, from Iran, and from the PRC as a way to make sure people understand what it is that they are getting. And we are not telling countries not to trade with China, but we are saying understand what the deal on the table is and the United States will work hard to make sure that we are giving countries the best option for them going forward. MODERATOR: Thank you so much. To those joining us online, feel free to raise your virtual hands or type your question in the chat if you have another question. In the meanwhile, sir, if I could take moderator’s prerogative and ask you if you have any prediction on how smooth the election in Honduras might be next year and what is an ideal situation. ASSISTANT SECRETARY NICHOLS: So Honduras is an important country for the United States. We’ve worked through our Root Causes Strategy and initiatives like Central America Forward and the Partnership for Central America to promote economic development in Honduras. We believe that the democratic process is vital for that country. We hope to see a transparent election that reflects the will of the Honduran people. We hope that candidates who may have past ties to drug trafficking or international criminal activities will not make it to the final round of the elections there. And we note that our aspirations for Honduras are to maintain strong ties with the United States, to maintain our strong trading relationship, our security partnership, and the human connections that we have where there is a large Honduran diaspora in the United States and important American investment in Honduras. MODERATOR: Thank you so much. Go ahead, Manik. QUESTION: I’m just thinking about something which crept into my mind as you were talking about the migration issues. President-elect Donald Trump had a conversation with the Mexican President Sheinbaum. And while Mr. Trump made a statement that the Mexican president had agreed on almost everything he had proposed, here comes a contradiction from her stating that Mexico is free and also at liberty to allow migrants to come into the country and cannot stop it. How do you read that? ASSISTANT SECRETARY NICHOLS: Well, I’ll note that during our administration Mexico has been an excellent partner on migration issues. The Mexican Government shares information with us. They take action to address the movement of migrants through their territory. I would refer you to the excellent article in the New York Times that just appeared talking about some of the ways that Mexico does that. The Mexican Government and the United States Government have a longstanding partnership across a whole host of issues, and I know that people on both sides of the border deeply value that relationship. And I think that going forward it’s important for Mexican authorities to take into account our concerns, but we also need to take into account their concern. And in that spirit of partnership, the Biden administration’s been able to, as I said, reduce the level of migrants arriving at our southwest border dramatically, and we expect that with continued cooperation that progress can continue. QUESTION: Thank you. MODERATOR: Thank you. Maybe we can end with one last question. Again, moderator’s prerogative. Can you talk a little bit about how the U.S. is supporting the MSS and Haiti and what results do we hope to see from it? ASSISTANT SECRETARY NICHOLS: So the United States is providing robust assistance to the Multinational Security Support mission in Haiti. We contracted to build the base that the MSS is occupying, the life-sustainment area. We have provided food, ammunition, vehicles, health care, drones, radios, all manor of supplies for the MSS – air lift capabilities, and it has been an investment that by the end of the administration will be over $600 million. Partners around the world have provided another 100 million – over a $100 million in assistance through the UN Trust Fund for the Haiti MSS. But we need to see more. We need to see resourcing that is sustainable for the mission and predictable so that they can plan against that. That’s why the United States supports a transition to a more traditional peacekeeping operation in Haiti so that funding and resources and logistical support will be more equitably shared among the international community and predictable for the Haitian people and for the countries that are contributing – not just Kenya but also Guatemala, Bahamas, Jamaica, Belize, El Salvador. We believe that that coalition is a testament to the support of the international community for the Haitian people, and we want to see that support continue in a robust and predictable way. MODERATOR: Thank you so much. I think that concludes today’s briefing. Today’s briefing was on the record, and we’ll provide a transcript later this afternoon. Thanks to everyone who joined us online and in person on this rainy day. Thank you, Assistant Secretary. ASSISTANT SECRETARY NICHOLS: Thank you, Daphne.