Washington has spent too long treating Latin America as a problem to be managed rather than a strategic neighborhood to be strengthened. As the United States approaches the 2026 midterm elections, policymakers should recognize an opportunity hiding in plain sight: expanding the Shield of the Americas into a durable hemispheric partnership spanning security, energy, critical minerals, infrastructure, and trade.
The stakes are no longer theoretical.
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China’s economic footprint across Latin America has expanded rapidly, while Beijing has demonstrated an appetite for strategically important infrastructure. A 2025 U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission report identified 37 Chinese port projects across Latin America and the Caribbean, warning that such facilities could be used to disrupt U.S. trade, monitor naval activity, or support coercive operations during a crisis.
The $1.3 billion Chinese-built Chancay deep-water port in Peru illustrates the challenge. It is commercially significant, but its strategic implications extend well beyond shipping. Meanwhile, the Panama Canal and surrounding logistics infrastructure have become an increasingly visible arena for U.S.-China competition.
America cannot afford to respond only after strategic footholds have been established.
The Shield of the Americas should therefore evolve from a narrowly defined security initiative into an Americas-wide economic and security architecture. That means inviting willing nations across Central America, South America, and the Caribbean to participate in practical partnerships that create alternatives to Chinese capital, technology, and infrastructure.
The economic case is equally compelling.
The International Energy Agency’s 2026 analysis found that Latin America and the Caribbean account for approximately 40% of global copper mine production and about one-quarter of global lithium supply. Yet the region refines only about one-fifth of the key energy minerals it extracts, leaving enormous value to be captured elsewhere. With appropriate investment, regional processing could generate approximately $220 billion in economic value by 2035.
This is precisely where American investment and policy can intersect with national security.
Washington should pursue a hemispheric strategy that encourages responsible mining, domestic and regional processing, reliable electricity, modern ports, digital infrastructure, and secure telecommunications. U.S. companies should be positioned to build these systems alongside Latin American partners rather than watching Chinese state-backed enterprises fill the vacuum.
There is already evidence that the opportunity exists. According to the Inter-American Development Bank, Latin American exports to China increased 25% year over year in the first quarter of 2026, while U.S.-bound exports grew 14%. Chinese shipments into the region increased 29%, compared with just 4% growth in U.S. exports to Latin America.
The message for Congress should be straightforward: engagement is not charity, it is strategic competition.
A stronger Shield of the Americas can also address narcotics trafficking, illegal migration, and organized crime by strengthening the institutions and economies that make those problems harder to exploit. But military cooperation cannot substitute for economic opportunity. Security partnerships should be accompanied by trade, infrastructure, energy, and workforce initiatives that give America’s hemispheric partners compelling reasons to choose deeper alignment with Washington.
The midterm elections will inevitably focus on inflation, immigration, energy prices, and national security. Latin America connects all four.
The next Congress should make the Western Hemisphere a bipartisan strategic priority. That means expanding the Shield of the Americas geographically, broadening its mission, and giving willing partners a reason to see the U.S. not merely as a market or military power, but as their preferred long-term economic and security partner.
THE REAL ENERGY WAR WITH CHINA IS HAPPENING NEXT DOOR
China is playing the long game in the Americas. Washington should, too.
The hemisphere is America’s neighborhood. The time has come to treat it like one.
Duggan Flanakin is a policy analyst and writer focused on energy, environmental, and geopolitical issues.
