The Trump Corollary’s Haiti Test
Abstract
The Trump Administration has made restoring America’s dominance and presence in the Western Hemisphere a priority. Yet Haiti remains a persistent challenge, with limited security interventions failing to make a lasting difference against the gang control that undermines the country’s security, drives migration, and threatens the stability of the region. Ahead of elections scheduled in Haiti for December 2026, Washington should rethink its approach and pair security assistance with sustained efforts to rebuild political institutions and state capacity.
The Trump administration has made clear that it is prioritizing North America, the Caribbean, and South America. The 2025 National Security Strategy vowed to “restore American preeminence in the Western Hemisphere.” But despite an increased focus and a demonstrated willingness to use force to restore order across the region, the United States has failed to articulate a strategy for Haiti, a country whose long-standing political dysfunction presents a persistent security risk to the United States and the Western Hemisphere. If the United States wants to fully execute the “Trump Corollary,” it will need to pair security interventions with a strategy to rebuild political institutions and state capacity to make a lasting difference in Haiti. The enactment of the Trump Corollary over the last eighteen months has taken a mostly military approach, prioritizing coercive military action in a variety of countries. To make a meaningful change in Haiti, the US will need to pair military pressure with the creation of lasting political structures. The time to do so is now, as the Gang Suppression Force prepares to launch and Haiti is set to hold its first elections in a decade in December 2026.
The Trump Corollary in Action
The 2025 National Security Strategy, which outlined the so-called “Trump Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine,” made clear that a major focus of the Trump administration would be on the Western Hemisphere. Early pressure from the United States toward Panama produced results. Panama uninstalled Huawei telecommunications towers, pulled out of the Belt and Road Initiative, and canceled the contracts for a Hong Kong-based company to manage the ports on either end of the Panama Canal. The United States has also taken an active role in supporting right-wing candidates across the hemisphere. Trump previously endorsed President Abelardo de la Espriella in Colombia and offered a $1 billion security package to Colombia on de la Espriella’s first day in office.
Washington’s focus also includes an expanded military presence that it is increasingly willing to use when it perceives threats to its interests. Thus far, the United States has undertaken an operation to oust ex-Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro, ramped up pressure on the Cuban regime, and launched a series of strikes on boats in the Eastern Pacific and the Caribbean, while also announcing expanded ground operations in a variety of countries across the region.
A Persistent Challenge
Haiti, the Western Hemisphere’s poorest country, has been destabilized by repeated foreign interventions, the 2010 earthquake, and the 2021 assassination of President Jovenel Moise, which plunged the nation deeper into crisis. Haiti has had no elected officials since 2023, and the Transitional Presidential Council, which has managed the country for almost two years, saw its mandate expire in February of this year. Haiti is currently led by acting prime minister and de facto head of state Alix Didier Fils-Aimé, whose government is preparing for the country’s first elections in a decade, scheduled for December of this year.
The Haitian government has struggled to manage the humanitarian crisis facing the country. Almost two-thirds of the population lives below the poverty line, and the country is reliant on external revenue via foreign aid and remittances, although foreign aid levels have decreased. In the face of this political vacuum, criminal gangs have sought to take control. Gang violence remains widespread across the capital of Port-au-Prince, with estimates showing that 26 different gangs control up to 90 percent of the city’s territory. Widespread criminal control of the city has impacted civilians, with at least 5,519 people killed between March 2025 and January 2026 in Haiti as gangs have expanded beyond Port-au-Prince.
Haiti, only 700 miles from Florida, is an active security crisis that can impose increasing costs on the United States and the broader Caribbean region. This ongoing violence continues to drive both internal displacement and outward migration, including toward the United States. Established as a pathway in the aftermath of the 2010 earthquake, the recent decision by the Trump administration to end the Temporary Protected Status for more than 300,000 Haitians in the United States calls into question what the future of legal migration toward the United States will be. This decision, combined with persistent violence in Haiti, raises the risk of increased illegal migration flows into the United States. And the spread of gang violence occurring in Haiti will not necessarily be constrained to one country. The Bahamas, the Dominican Republic, Turks and Caicos, and other countries have seen a rise in violence linked in some cases to the ongoing situation in Haiti.
New Approaches, Same Outcome?
The US and international partners have tried to undertake efforts to stabilize Haiti in the past, but these have been focused on specific challenges, namely the deteriorating security situation. In 2023, the United Nations Security Council authorized the creation of the Multinational Security Support (MSS) mission to Haiti, deployed in 2024, to counter the gang rule that has gripped the country. But the MSS lacked the necessary funding to make a difference, with the US committing $970 million toward the mission while other countries failed to provide comparable financial support. It was also supposed to reach a full force size of 2,500 but struggled to even mobilize 1,000 members. Led by Kenyan police officers, the MSS did little to stem the violence before the mission ended in April of 2026.
Haitian security forces, in partnership with private security contractors, have carried out drone strikes against gangs, which have killed over a thousand people, at least 60 of whom were not suspected gang members. While drone attacks have helped to quell the momentum of gangs, they have not meaningfully eroded their criminal governance structures or their territorial control. Furthermore, the loss of civilian life with no accountability risks turning civilian opinion against the Haitian government.
In May 2025, the US government designated two major Haitian gangs, the Viv Ansanm coalition and Gran Grif, as foreign terrorist organizations, and in 2026, the US announced its support of the UN-backed Gang Suppression Force, a new alternative to the MSS. The GSF will be staffed by a mix of soldiers and police officers and will receive dedicated support from the UN as well as a more formal command structure with soldiers and police officers reporting to civilians. The GSF is planned to be larger than the MSS, and its initial mandate includes “intelligence-led targeted, counter-gang operations to neutralize, isolate, and deter gangs.” The Force will support institutions needed to distribute aid and hold elections.
In theory, this mission has the potential to make a difference with an expanded scope, more staff, and more resources behind it. But, like the MSS, personnel contributions will remain voluntary, potentially limiting the effectiveness of the mission. The GSF is already behind schedule, and with it, so are efforts to create the improved security situation needed for elections to occur. Haiti’s Provisional Electoral Council originally planned to host elections in August 2026.
A New Path
Ultimately, without strategies to develop Haiti’s political situation and improve its security reality, lasting change is unlikely to occur. Regardless of how successful the GSF is in improving the security situation, the US and its allies will need to lean into rebuilding the institutions and political space needed to ensure effective governance. In the long-term, efforts to improve security alone will be insufficient to create the lasting conditions to stem the instability in Haiti.
The challenge is immense, but a starting point would be to improve the basic institutions needed to combat the criminal governance that gangs have used across Haiti to cement their grip on power. Using the GSF to secure areas and then investing in improving courts, the criminal justice system, and financial institutions can be the starting point to limiting the reach of gangs. From this, the next step would be to ensure the country is safe enough for elections to be held in December. Longer-term, the US must ensure it takes a democracy-first approach while bringing Haitians themselves into the process of rebuilding the country’s institutions.
To do this, Washington can lean on existing tools. Under the Global Fragility Act, signed into law during the first Trump administration, Haiti was selected as an initial priority country. Though a bill introduced in 2025 to reauthorize the GFA proposed that Haiti no longer qualified as a priority country, the act and the associated Global Fragility Strategy (GFS) still offer a roadmap applicable to Haiti. The plan outlined in the GFS can help to build long-term capacity for the institutions that can provide a check against the instability that Haiti is now facing. It provides an approach that melds security with long-term economic development and the strengthening of institutions.
President Trump has prioritized a focus on the Western Hemisphere marked by an aggressive military posture and a willingness to use force when necessary. Washington has demonstrated to allies and adversaries alike that it intends to play a major role in the region. It has strongly backed Fils-Aimé as prime minister, having supported him when members of the Transitional Presidential Council called for his removal. But the US needs to look beyond security interventions. Recognizing that elections are scheduled for December, the US should ensure the success of the GSF but also create the conditions for political and economic institutions to gain and retain legitimacy and power.
