U.S. Senate approves appointment of new chief diplomat for Latin America

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – After a half-year delay, the Senate completed the confirmation hearing for the top U.S. diplomat in charge of relations with Latin America and the Caribbean. Brian Nichols is the first African-American in this position in over four decades.

The Republican opposition, led by Senator Ted Cruz, blocked the nomination of diplomats for the past 6 months, but the process began to move forward in recent weeks.

Democratic Senator Bob Menendez, who also chairs the House Foreign Relations Committee, stressed that Nichols’ role is crucial at this time because of the great instability in various parts of the region.

As a Cuban-American, Menendez spoke of the current crisis in Cuba, where on July 11 the people took to the streets to demand freedom and an end to the dictatorship, triggering a wave of repression on the island. In addition to this is the ongoing instability in Nicaragua and the institutional precariousness in Haiti after the president’s assassination and the earthquake.

“With extensive experience in the Americas, Ambassador Brian Nichols, a career foreign service officer, will ably advance U.S. national interests,” Menendez told his Senate colleagues.

Nichols began his career in the diplomatic service in 1989 in Peru, where he learned to speak fluent Spanish. Between 1991 and 1993 he was a political officer in El Salvador. For three years in the late 1990s and early 2000s, he served as deputy political advisor in Mexico. From 2007 through 2010 he was deputy chief of mission at the American embassy in Colombia, and between 2014 and 2017 he returned to Peru as ambassador.

Back in Washington, from the Department of State headquarters, he was in charge of programs to fight drug trafficking in the region and led the offices of Caribbean and Central American Affairs.

“The Covid-19 pandemic continues to cause serious social and economic consequences in countries throughout the region. And there are enduring security and governance challenges in Central America that fuel irregular migration,” Menendez explained as he argued in favor of Nichols’ confirmation.

Born 56 years ago in Rhode Island, he studied at the prestigious Tufts University and has been married for over two decades to Geraldine Kam, also a U.S. foreign service officer with whom he has two daughters.

His diplomatic career has led him to live not only in Latin America, but also in Southeast Asia, where he served as a senior diplomat in Indonesia, and in Africa, where until just a few weeks ago he was the ambassador to Zimbabwe.

Upon being confirmed in office, one of the first to publicly congratulate him was Secretary General of the Organization of American States (OAS) Luis Almagro, who tweeted that he was “looking forward to continuing the partnership between the United States and the OAS to foster greater democracy, human rights, sustainable development and security for all in the Americas.”

Now confirmed in his post, Nichols will be immediately sworn in to lead the office, which until now had no appointed leader.