Four Ways the U.S. Can Help Advance Haiti's Progress

This September 2024 analysis assesses progress since Haiti's April 2024 political agreement mediated by CARICOM, which set a February 2026 timetable for an elected government: a transitional structure led by the Transition Presidential Council and PM Garry Conille is in place, and the Kenyan-led MSS is active. Fauriol notes Conille's dynamism against tensions within the TPC, and a perception problem around the MSS, which is not a U.N. peacekeeping operation but a support mission for the depleted Haitian National Police, and whose full Kenyan contingent of 1,000 will anyway be insufficient. Civil society readiness is flagged as underappreciated: the National Conference's Comité de Pilotage and the Groupe d'Assistance à la Transition (GAT) are first steps toward the February 2026 milestones of constitutional revision, a redefined societal compact and judicial reform.

The 90-day U.S. agenda has four planks. First, keep up with security: the U.S. as chief fundraiser must push others, especially in the hemisphere, to contribute, and support the MSS beyond funding (training, logistics, medical). Second, economic recovery: renew the HOPE/HELP trade preferences expiring September 2025, which have represented over 80 percent of Haiti's exports and whose demise would be catastrophic, and operationalize the Global Fragility Act's 10-year, locally led resilience approach, including support to Haiti's universities. Third, mobilize a diaspora that lacks a unified voice. Fourth, unify and clarify U.S. strategy across Caribbean, Latin American, European and multilateral relationships, including the World Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank; the challenge is not the absence of a strategy but its disaggregated character.