Foreign Policy for America 2026 Leadership Summit

The Trump administration official in charge of the State Department’s Africa Bureau recently wrote to his staff: “To put it bluntly, Africa is a peripheral – rather than a core – theater for U.S. interests that demands strategic economy.” This argument is out-of-step with contemporary realities. The continent’s population is booming, its people are innovating, and its resources power modern economies. It’s also the source of real threats, especially as armed groups hostile to the U.S. gain strength and territory. Americans, state and local governments, private companies and the next administration in Washington need to fashion a new approach to Africa based on mutual respect, learning and benefit.

This panel will address the building blocks of that approach, exploring how to strengthen broad U.S.-Africa relations when the federal government pursues transactional policies, and the planning and positioning that can happen now to prepare for the day that the federal government, regardless of the party in charge, recognizes the benefits of strengthening U.S.-Africa ties.


Speakers:

1. Dr. Fonteh Akum, Director, Africa Program, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
2. Katie Auth, Deputy Executive Director, Energy for Growth Hub
3. Dr. Ebenezer Obadare, Douglas Dillon senior fellow for Africa studies at the Council on Foreign Relations
4. Dr. Lesley Anne Warner, Former Senior Policy Advisor to U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations

Moderator:
Jon Temin, Visiting Fellow, SNF Agora Institute at Johns Hopkins University 

Despite efforts across multiple decades to shift the United States’s strategic focus to Asia, the United States remains unable or unwilling to do so. And with the Trump administration focused on the Western Hemisphere and the Middle East, experts are asking: how far will Trump pull back from Asia? With the recent examples of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the United States using extraordinary military force in Iran and Venezuela—an open question now looms about how China might internalize this new landscape and adjust its approach to Taiwan. This panel will explore how changes to the status quo in the Taiwan Strait would reshape the region and the world, how the United States should respond and what is realistic in this current environment, and how are our allies like Japan and South Korea are reacting to these changes and what can be done to manage these relationships.


Speakers:

1. Dr. Jessica Chen Weiss, David M. Lampton Professor of China Studies, Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies
2. Dr. Zack Cooper, Senior Fellow, American Enterprise Institute
3. Ellison Laskowski, Senate on Foreign Relations

Moderator:
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