Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah) introduced a resolution on Tuesday celebrating America’s achievement in creating the Panama Canal and calling for measures to safeguard it from China’s growing influence in the region.
Senators Rick Scott (R-Fla.), Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.), and Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) co-sponsored the resolution, which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations.
‘It would require the United States to take measures necessary to protect its rights under the Treaty.’
Lee noted the canal’s “vital importance” to the United States, particularly regarding trade, national security, and geopolitics.
The resolution explained that the U.S. government “funded, pioneered, and built” the Panama Canal from 1904 to 1914, adding that it cost $375 million and 10,000 lives.
Former President Jimmy Carter turned over control of the Panama Canal to Panama in 1977.
“The Treaty Concerning the Permanent Neutrality and Operation of the Panama Canal, signed at Washington September 7, 1977, otherwise known as the ‘Neutrality Treaty,’ reserved the right of the United States to use armed force to defend the permanent neutrality of the Panama Canal,” Lee’s resolution read.
However, despite the Neutrality Treaty, China’s influence in the Panama Canal has grown substantially over roughly the past decade, “pos[ing] a high risk of intelligence-gathering and surveillance.”
The U.S. is allowed to regain control of the canal if the neutrality agreement is violated.
“Now, therefore, be it Resolved, That the Senate,” the resolution continued, “recognizes the ingenuity and labor of Americans that made the Panama Canal possible for future generations, with special regard for those Americans who lost their lives in pursuit of the Panama Canal project”; “expresses that the Panama Canal is vital to United States regional security, hemispheric hegemony, and economic interests”; “assesses that a pattern of Chinese-backed investment in port infrastructure and canal operations in Panama constitutes a violation of the Neutrality Treaty”; and “urges the Trump administration to ensure that the canal remains neutral and to take all appropriate measures to enforce the Neutrality Treaty.”
Lee wrote in a post on X, “The Panama Canal is a great American achievement, and President Trump is right to re-assert the Monroe Doctrine and American dominance of our hemisphere’s vital waterways.”
Over the weekend, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that he met with Panamanian President José Raúl Mulino “to make clear that the United States cannot, and will not, allow the Chinese Communist Party to continue with its effective and growing control over the Panama Canal area.”
State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce stated, “Secretary Rubio made clear that this status quo is unacceptable and that absent immediate changes, it would require the United States to take measures necessary to protect its rights under the Treaty.”
Following Rubio’s visit, Mulino declared that Panama would leave the Belt and Road Initiative, a Chinese global infrastructure project.
The State Department claims the initiative “preys on other countries via unsustainable and corrupt lending while ignoring global labor and environmental standards.”
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