atlanticcouncil.org

The US needs to build a new Caribbean policy. Rubio’s trip to the region can be the first step.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio will make his first major trip to the Caribbean this week, starting in Jamaica on Wednesday before heading to Guyana and Suriname. In February, Rubio’s first trip abroad as secretary of state saw him stop in the Dominican Republic at the end of his tour through nearby Central America. But his visit this week, which is focused on the Caribbean, is a chance to see how the second Trump administration is approaching this important but too-often-overlooked region.

Rubio will find a region undergoing profound changes both negative and positive. Crime and violence are on the rise, which is hurting the private sector, especially tourism, a main lifeline for many economies in the region. At the same time, the Caribbean is poised to become an energy powerhouse by the end of the decade thanks to recent discoveries and energy development.

This week, Caribbean leaders will welcome Rubio’s visit, as they are eager to influence US policy toward the region over the next four years. On the US side, Rubio has an opportunity to come away from the trip with a new strategy for the region that can yield tangible benefits and protect US and Caribbean interests alike. This new strategy should have two priorities:

lowering barriers to US investment in Caribbean energy, which can bolster energy security for the wider region, including the United States, and

helping countries in the region reduce crime and violence, which can protect US citizens traveling abroad.

Untapped potential

The Caribbean’s proximity to US shores has earned it the nickname “the United States’ third border.” As with the countries on its land borders, the United States shares strong trade, commercial, and people-to-people ties with Caribbean nations. More than twenty million US citizens travel to the Caribbean each year for overnight stays, and the United States remains the Caribbean’s top trading partner. Five of Taiwan’s twelve remaining diplomatic allies are in the Caribbean. And Guyana, Suriname, and Trinidad and Tobago collectively house enough hydrocarbon resources to make them active players in global oil and gas markets.

Yet despite the importance of the Caribbean for US interests, the region has long suffered from inattention and inconsistent US foreign policy. The result is a relationship that relies on ad-hoc engagement and has forced countries to look elsewhere for assistance, from China to India to African nations. While in office, former US Vice President Kamala Harris sought to rectify this by launching the US-Caribbean Partnership to Address the Climate Crisis 2030, but it did not have enough time to take root and it failed to deliver long-lasting benefits. Now, early in the second Trump administration, Rubio can use this week’s trip as a starting point to design, build, and implement a Caribbean strategy that serves US and regional interests alike over the next four years and beyond.

What a US Caribbean strategy needs

Two points are critical to any successful US strategy in the Caribbean. First, it must be a whole-of-government effort that uses and amplifies existing diplomatic, economic, and security partnerships with the Caribbean. Fortunately, there are various forms of active US cooperation with Caribbean nations in all three of these areas. For example, US embassy officials across the region have built trust among locals and the private sector, making the United States a first-choice partner. US Southern Command’s defense partnerships with Caribbean militaries (except The Bahamas) has significantly enhanced capacity building and training for pre- and post-natural disaster events as part of its annual Tradewinds exercise.

The challenge will be to coordinate these various activities into one coherent strategy. In practice, this first means creating a new framework that can house current US policy initiatives in the Caribbean across different US agencies, identifying opportunities to scale engagement. Next, Washington will need to allocate the resources needed to in-region US embassies and other US policy instruments, such as US Southern Command and the State Department’s Caribbean office, to implement these measures.

Second, while Rubio’s trip is an important sign from administration that it takes the Caribbean seriously, US policy must go beyond high-level government-to-government engagement to succeed. There are five national elections set to take place in the Caribbean by the end of this year. Relying solely on interactions with the region’s national governments, some of which could change soon, limits the local private sector and regional institutions’ ability to help implement US-Caribbean policy decisions. Institutionalized partnerships with local business chambers and more engagement with development institutions, such as the Caribbean Development Bank, can offset any political uncertainty associated with upcoming general elections.

With these two principles in mind, where should the United States focus its attention? Reducing crime and violence should take precedence. In 2024, nine of the top ten countries in Latin America and the Caribbean with the highest homicide rates were in the Caribbean, primarily due to increasing gang proliferation and the illegal trafficking of small arms originating from the United States. The recent reintroduction of the Caribbean Basin Security Initiative Authorization Act by the US Congress—which allocates $88 million annually through 2029—is expected to help address the region’s security challenges, but the appropriated resources alone are insufficient given the scale of the problem. Caribbean countries also need increased technical assistance from the Pentagon and US Southern Command to increase police and military capacity to address the transit of illicit arms and drugs. Doing so would ensure greater stability for Caribbean countries and help protect the millions of US citizens traveling abroad to the region.

Next, Caribbean countries are uniquely positioned to welcome increased US investment in the region’s energy market. Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana, and Suriname’s natural gas potential provide a hub for future investment. Each of those countries already has US and Western operators, but the derivatives from natural gas usage—such as ammonia, urea, plastics, and aluminum—also provide opportunities for US companies. For example, building and operating new ammonia and urea plants—which will have a ready-made market for export in the Caribbean—would enable US companies to invest at scale in a region where project size is on the smaller end. There are also energy investment opportunities in the eastern Caribbean, which houses significant geothermal reserves. New technological advances in geothermalexploration and financial backing from Wall Street could reduce costs and risks enough to entice US companies to consider making investments.

Since the power generation projects in the Caribbean are small relative to those in Latin America, Rubio should consider working with the US International Development Finance Corporation to subsidize pre-project costs for US companies willing to take the time to determine the viability of energy projects in the Caribbean. Moreover, given that potential geothermal projects reside in some of the countries with diplomatic ties to Taiwan, and the region’s future natural gas producers already have large-scale Chinese investments in the energy sector, increasing US competitiveness in this industry could go a long way toward counterbalancing potential Chinese engagement.

If the Caribbean truly is the United States’ “third border,” then it is important to US national security and economic interests to invest the resources and time in strengthening relations with the region. Rubio’s trip is the second Trump administration’s first real opportunity to do this. Resources, assistance, and institutionalized engagement will be needed—all of which can yield tangible benefits for the United States over the next four years and beyond.

Wazim Mowla is the fellow and lead of the Caribbean Initiative at the Atlantic Council’s Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center.