Ke­jan Haynes

Mem­bers of the US Con­gress, Con­gress­man Joaquin Cas­tro (TX-20), Con­gress­woman María Elvi­ra Salazar (FL-27), and Con­gress­man Adri­ano Es­pail­lat (NY-13) are pi­lot­ing leg­is­la­tion which they hope could mod­ernise U.S. en­gage­ment with Caribbean na­tions.

Called the U.S.-Caribbean Strate­gic En­gage­ment Act of 2023 they're call­ing on the U.S. De­part­ment of State to de­vel­op a mul­ti-year strat­e­gy for U.S. en­gage­ment with the Caribbean.

The pro­pos­al comes as U.S. Vice Pres­i­dent Ka­mala Har­ris is set to meet with Cari­com lead­ers in the Ba­hamas to­day, in keep­ing with a promise last year to hold more meet­ings with lead­ers of the re­gion. In a re­lease, the team from the U.S Con­gressed pro­posed sev­er­al mea­sur­ing in the Bill aimed at:

Re­duc­ing the flow of il­lic­it Unit­ed States firearms to the Caribbean re­gion and pro­vid­ing tech­ni­cal sup­port, train­ing, and in­for­ma­tion-shar­ing to Caribbean se­cu­ri­ty forces charged with mon­i­tor­ing mar­itime bor­ders, in­clud­ing for­mal and in­for­mal ports of en­try.

Im­prov­ing en­er­gy se­cu­ri­ty, re­silien­cy, and in­de­pen­dence by work­ing to fi­nance in­creased ac­cess to di­verse, re­li­able, se­cure, and af­ford­able re­new­able pow­er so­lu­tions.

Sup­port­ing re­gion­al adap­ta­tion and re­silience to the cli­mate-dri­ven ef­fects of se­vere weath­er events and nat­ur­al dis­as­ters.

Ad­vanc­ing co­op­er­a­tion on democ­ra­cy and hu­man rights through­out the re­gion and in mul­ti­lat­er­al fo­ra.

Im­prov­ing pub­lic health co­op­er­a­tion and in­fra­struc­ture to mit­i­gate health con­cerns and threats to the Caribbean re­gion, in­clud­ing through pro­fes­sion­al ex­changes, med­ical ed­u­ca­tion, and U.S. ex­ports of med­ical ser­vices, tech­nol­o­gy, and phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals to pre­pare for fu­ture pan­demics and health emer­gen­cies, ex­pand­ing the ac­ces­si­bil­i­ty of health ser­vices to mar­gin­al­ized pop­u­la­tions, and re­duc­ing de­pen­dence on med­ical im­ports from ma­lign ac­tors in the re­gion and else­where.

Sup­port­ing re­gion­al ini­tia­tives to ad­vance food se­cu­ri­ty through­out the Caribbean.

Ex­pand­ing in­ter­net ac­cess through­out the re­gion, es­pe­cial­ly for mar­gin­al­ized com­mu­ni­ties, while work­ing co­op­er­a­tive­ly to en­hance da­ta pri­va­cy and se­cu­ri­ty.

Ad­vanc­ing ac­cess to ed­u­ca­tion and crit­i­cal skills for at-risk youth, women, and girls in the Caribbean re­gion.

Be­low are com­ments from the Con­gress­men:

“Over the sev­en years since Con­gress last di­rect­ed the State De­part­ment to de­vel­op a strat­e­gy for en­gage­ment with the Caribbean, the chal­lenges and op­por­tu­ni­ties faced by the Unit­ed States and our Caribbean part­ners have changed sig­nif­i­cant­ly,” said Con­gress­man Cas­tro. “To­day, as we ex­plore new pos­si­bil­i­ties for re­gion­al in­te­gra­tion and eco­nom­ic growth and con­front new threats – from cli­mate change to de­mo­c­ra­t­ic back­slid­ing – the time has come for an up­dat­ed strat­e­gy. The U.S.-Caribbean Strate­gic En­gage­ment Act of 2023 demon­strates Con­gress’ bi­par­ti­san com­mit­ment to deep­en­ing our re­la­tion­ship with Caribbean na­tions and im­prov­ing the lives of peo­ple across the West­ern Hemi­sphere. I thank Chair­woman Salazar and Con­gress­man Es­pail­lat for their part­ner­ship on this bill and look for­ward to mov­ing this im­por­tant leg­is­la­tion for­ward.”

“It is in the best in­ter­est of South Flori­da and the Unit­ed States to have a se­cure, pros­per­ous, and sov­er­eign Caribbean,” said Con­gress­woman Salazar. “We need to have a pro­duc­tive strat­e­gy to make sure it re­mains one of the world’s top des­ti­na­tions for in­vest­ment and tourism. A safe Caribbean is good for tourism, na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty, and eas­es the mi­gra­tion cri­sis.”

“As we con­tin­ue our co­or­di­nat­ed ef­forts to strength­en U.S. re­la­tions through­out the Caribbean, my col­leagues and I feel it is im­por­tant to up­date the U.S.-Caribbean Strate­gic En­gage­ment Act of 2016 to re­flect the cur­rent chal­lenges the re­gion is fac­ing as of 2023. I am proud to co-lead this new bill, which will up­date the 2016 law to re­quire our gov­ern­ment to cre­ate a strat­e­gy to ad­dress the grow­ing threat of il­lic­it gun traf­fick­ing and vi­o­lence in the Caribbean, while si­mul­ta­ne­ous­ly im­prov­ing re­new­able en­er­gy ac­cess, cli­mate adap­ta­tion ef­forts, and pub­lic health co­op­er­a­tion ef­forts through­out the re­gion,” said Con­gress­man Es­pail­lat.