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The United States has more significant ties to Latin America and the Caribbean than any other region.
We share languages, values, cultures, and economic interests in a rapidly changing world. The Western Hemisphere has over a billion people and an economy worth over $37 trillion. We grow enough food and produce enough critical minerals to sustain every country in the Western Hemisphere. Our region, the “Americas,” has the potential for exponential growth—but tapping that potential requires a new approach.
U.S. policymakers have always treated our hemisphere as an afterthought. This neglect has led to incoherent and inconsistent U.S. policies. We cannot afford to ignore the Western Hemisphere any longer. China has taken notice and used our absence to expand its influence and fuel instability in the region. This political instability, coupled with economic insecurity, is a primary driver of migration to the United States.
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Our Americas Act would usher in real change across the hemisphere. It creates an Americas Partnership to expand U.S. trade and markets in Latin America and the Caribbean. At the same time, it counters the uneven playing field China has built using forced labor, deceptive trade practices, and manipulation of critical supply chains.
The Americas Partnership would unify Western Hemisphere democracies in combatting corruption, strengthen democracy and the rule of law, harmonize standards, reduce barriers to foreign direct investment, and promote real private sector large-scale infrastructure investments. Additionally, the Americas Act offers tax incentives for companies in strategic industries to bring critical supply chains back from China. To improve the existing, successful financing systems in place, the Americas Act creates a Build Americas Unit within the Development Finance Corporation, an investment bank tailored to enhance the hemisphere’s critical investment needs.
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The four of us represent different regions across the United States. But we all know that the United States must help develop our hemisphere for more substantial and lasting cooperation with free democracies in Latin America and the Caribbean. This increases stability and reduces the influence of gangs, crime, and the dangerous inner workings of the global underworld. For every dollar we trade within our hemisphere, we grow more prosperous and create lasting jobs in the U.S. and throughout the hemisphere. In the process, we counter China.
The Americas Act establishes a special U.S. Customs and Border Protection enforcement unit to exclude Uyghur forced labor from shared supply chains and creates a program to facilitate Latin America’s energy transition and security.
The Americas Act will also improve already-strong people-to-people connections by expanding scholarship programs, creating a new American University of the Americas in the region, funding English language education, and establishing a new CARE visa, among other activities that will help stitch our countries together.
Perhaps most important, our program is fully paid for. It will cost only as much money as it brings in by closing a trade loophole that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) exploits to bring in 6 billion packages without paying duties and taxes. Known as “de minimis,” it’s the most egregious trillion-dollar free trade agreement with China that has gone under the radar for far too long.
The Americas Act is anchored by Western Hemisphere countries’ shared commitment to freedom, democracy, and opportunity. It will be the cornerstone upon which we build a stronger hemisphere.
Bill Cassidy, a physician, was elected to the U.S. Senate as a Republican representing Louisiana in 2014 and earlier served for six years in the U.S. House.
