\n<\/p>\n
Shortly after taking office in January, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio pledged to carry out what he called an \u201cAmericas First\u201d foreign policy. \u201cU.S. foreign policy has long focused on other regions while overlooking our own,\u201d he wrote<\/a> in a Wall Street Journal<\/em> op-ed. \u201cThat ends now.\u201d<\/p>\n Rubio\u2019s first official trip in February took him to five Latin American and Caribbean nations. Since then, nonstop attention from U.S. President Donald Trump has injected further unpredictability into a region where politics were already volatile. Some ideologically aligned leaders, such as in Argentina and El Salvador, have bought into the MAGA vision<\/a>\u2014striking shady<\/a> deals<\/a> with the United States that have come under scrutiny from Democrats.<\/p>\n The Trump administration has wielded U.S. economic and military might to try and extract concessions from other countries that don\u2019t toe its line. This month, the White House marked the anniversary of the Monroe Doctrine<\/a> by adding a \u201cTrump corollary<\/a>\u201d that emphasizes U.S. \u201ccontrol\u201d over the Western Hemisphere.<\/p>\n In January, Colombian President Gustavo Petro reneged on a pledge not to accept U.S. deportation flights after Trump threatened punitive tariffs on his country\u2014the biggest exporter of cut flowers<\/a> to the United States. After Rubio\u2019s visit in February, Panama quickly caved to U.S. demands that a Hong Kong-based firm relinquish its stake in two Panama Canal ports.<\/p>\n Other countries have put up more resistance. In the face of unprecedented U.S. meddling in the Brazilian justice system, authorities held strong and convicted former President Jair Bolsonaro of plotting a coup. By diversifying its trading partners, Brazil\u2019s economy\u2014South America\u2019s largest\u2014appears poised to weather one of the highest U.S. tariff rates in the world.<\/p>\n No action has jolted the region more this year than the U.S. military strikes on boats in the Caribbean, which began in September. The Trump administration said that it is targeting suspected drug smugglers, but it has not provided evidence or received authorization from Congress.<\/p>\n Many analysts suspect that the attacks, which have so far killed more than 100 people, may be a prelude to U.S. efforts at regime change in Venezuela. Leaders who had mended ties with Washington now find themselves in a bind over whether to speak out. Petro and his family were swiftly hit with U.S. sanctions<\/a> after he called the strikes \u201cmurder.\u201d<\/p>\n All eyes are now on Caracas, where Venezuela\u2019s Nobel Peace Prize-winning opposition leader has voiced support for what she calls Trump\u2019s \u201cwar.\u201d Officials in Washington have reportedly alluded to the 1989 U.S. invasion of Panama as a model for military action in Venezuela; that operation took place over Christmas.<\/p>\n While the world watches and waits, here are five of Foreign Policy<\/em>\u2019s best reads on Latin America\u2019s turbulent year.<\/p>\n By Christina Guevara, Feb. 5<\/em><\/p>\n Since his inauguration, Trump has displayed an \u201cimperial fixation\u201d with Panama, Christina Guevara writes. \u201cWe gave it to Panama, and we\u2019re taking it back,\u201d Trump said<\/a> of the Panama Canal, falsely claiming that China controls the waterway.<\/p>\n In reality, the United States has \u201cconflated\u2014intentionally or unintentionally\u2014Chinese companies operating nearby ports with Chinese control of the canal itself,\u201d Guevara writes. On his trip to Panama in February, Rubio threatened U.S. action if Hong Kong conglomerate CK Hutchison did not sell its majority share<\/a> in two ports. The company acquiesced a month later.<\/p>\n The saga was \u201call too familiar to Panamanians,\u201d who have endured a long history of U.S. intervention, Guevara writes. Today, they \u201care steadfast in their determination to protect the canal.\u201d<\/p>\n By Noah Bullock, March 20<\/em><\/p>\n Rubio\u2019s February trip also included a stop in El Salvador. Whereas his visit to Panama involved threats and coercion, Rubio\u2019s sojourn in El Salvador was chummy: Autocratic Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele has fashioned himself a close Trump ally and sought to ingratiate himself with the administration.<\/p>\n Bukele suggested that El Salvador detain migrants deported from the United States, an offer that Rubio called an \u201cextraordinary gesture.\u201d Bukele has made mass incarceration the cornerstone of his agenda<\/a>, opening the world\u2019s largest prison in 2023. In the weeks and months that followed, the White House defied a judge\u2019s orders to send planeloads of migrants to the small Central American nation, which it reportedly paid $6 million.<\/p>\n \u201cThe American people must be clear-eyed about the prison system to which their government is sending deported migrants\u2014which, in the worst-case scenario, could one day hold U.S. citizens, too,\u201d writes Noah Bullock, the executive director of Cristosal, a Central American human rights group. Bullock\u2019s organization has spent years documenting abuses in El Salvador, which he lays out in a chilling piece.<\/p>\n By Oliver Stuenkel, Sept. 12<\/em><\/p>\n
\n1. Panama Isn\u2019t Surprised by Trump\u2019s Imperial Fixation<\/a><\/h3>\n
\n2. The Horror Inside the Salvadoran Prisons Where Trump Is Sending Migrants<\/strong><\/a><\/h3>\n
\n3. Brazil\u2019s Historic Conviction<\/strong><\/a><\/h3>\n