Trump State Department nominee says private sector investment should replace foreign aid

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A sign and flowers lay near the entrance of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) headquarters in Washington on 07 February 2025. Following the Trump administration reorganization plans, spearheaded by billionaire Elon Musk, around 300 members were expected to remain out of the USAID’s worldwide total of more than 10,000. Photo: EPA-EFE

Published: 6:41am, 5 Mar 2025

A senior official poised to be the next US deputy secretary of state testified before lawmakers on Tuesday that Washington should shift US foreign engagement away from traditional aid and toward private sector investment.

Endorsing broad cuts to foreign aid under US President Donald Trump’s administration, Christopher Landau, a former ambassador to Mexico, told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in his confirmation hearing that US diplomacy should “restore commercial statecraft as a pillar of our foreign policy”.

He argued that economic engagement through private investment instead of government aid would be a more sustainable and effective approach to countering foreign influence, particularly from China.

Landau pointed to his time as ambassador to Mexico, nearly two years that ended in January 2021, when he noted how Beijing’s diplomats in the Latin American country – the region’s second-largest economy – were able to pledge investments through state-backed companies while he lacked the authority to do the same.

“If I were to go to a [Mexican] state and they would talk to me about their investment needs and their resources, I have to go to the private sector. I could not tell them what we’re going to do,” he said.

Christopher Landau testifies at a US Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on his nomination to be deputy secretary of state, on Capitol Hill in Washington on Tuesday. Photo: AFP

Tuesday’s discussion addressed the international upheaval and domestic infighting caused by Trump’s massive cuts to foreign aid, mostly provided through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), which critics contend undercut America’s competition with China.