Many academic studies and current-affairs commentaries use the term “New Monroe Doctrine” to summarize the current Trump administration’s foreign policy toward Latin America and even the Western Hemisphere as a whole. This reflects the fact that Trump’s regional policy has inherited many of the traditions of the Monroe Doctrine, while at the same time exhibiting certain new characteristics. 

(1) The Meaning of the Monroe Doctrine

Examining how past U.S. administrations and political figures have discussed the Monroe Doctrine, it can be argued that, in the history of U.S. foreign relations, the Monroe Doctrine has had three main layers of meaning: the exclusion of extraregional great powers, intervention in Latin American countries, and isolationist diplomacy. Among these, the exclusion of extraregional great powers and intervention in Latin American countries constitute the main themes of the Monroe Doctrine’s policy toward Latin America. The Monroe Doctrine expressed, either explicitly or implicitly, the first two meanings of Monroeism. In the address, President James Monroe clearly opposed European countries’ involvement in Western Hemisphere affairs. This position also implicitly conveyed the United States’ preferences regarding the political systems of neighboring countries, thereby laying the groundwork for later intervention in their affairs. 

The Monroe Doctrine’s exclusion of extraregional great powers has repeatedly manifested itself in U.S. foreign policy. In the 19th century, U.S. Presidents James K. Polk and Ulysses S. Grant, as well as Secretary of State Richard Olney, all cited the Monroe Doctrine to articulate the United States’ opposite to European great-power interference in the Americas. In the early 20th century, Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, in response to the activities of Japanese enterprises in Mexico, put forward the “Lodge Corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine. This held that the United States should oppose foreign powers (including corporations) seeking to acquire strategic land in the Western Hemisphere that could threaten the United States. In effect, this expanded the scope of the Monroe Doctrine’s application. During the Cold War, the strategic contest between the United States and the Soviet Union in Latin America activated this meaning of the Monroe Doctrine. In 1962, on the eve of the Cuban Missile Crisis, President John F. Kennedy stated that the Monroe Doctrine meant the United States could not remain indifferent to ties between the Soviet Union and Cuba. 

Relatively speaking, the content of the Monroe Doctrine concerning U.S. intervention in Latin American countries emerged later. In the early 20th century, President Theodore Roosevelt put forward the Monroe Doctrine’s “Roosevelt Corollary,” emphasizing that the United States should exercise an “international police” power to intervene in Latin American countries. During the Cold War, the well-known U.S. diplomat George Kennan, after surveying Latin America, invoked the Monroe Doctrine to advocate supporting Latin American dictators in order to contain regional left-wing forces. In the 1980s, U.S. Central Intelligence Agency officials likewise invoked the Monroe Doctrine to provide justification for supporting the Nicaraguan opposition. However, the negative consequences of the interventionism under the Monroe Doctrine also prompted criticism and reflection within the United States. For example, in the late 1920s, U.S. diplomat J. Reuben Clark argued that the Monroe Doctrine was originally directed at Europe rather than Latin America, and on that basis rejected the “Roosevelt Corollary.” In 2013, Secretary of State John Kerry also stated that “the era of the Monroe Doctrine has ended.” 

Isolationist diplomacy, by contrast, constitutes a relatively secondary component of the Monroe Doctrine. In his address to Congress, Monroe noted that the United States would not involve itself in European affairs, which meant that from its inception the doctrine carried a certain isolationist undertone. However, as the United States later began to gradually expand outward and build alliance systems, the isolationist coloring of the Monroe Doctrine became relatively muted. It was not until after the end of the Cold War that the isolationist dimension of the Monroe Doctrine received more extensive articulation from U.S. political figures. In his book A Republic, Not an Empire, the conservative Patrick J. Buchanan, who made several attempts to run for president, argued against excessive U.S. intervention on a global scale and maintained that the Monroe Doctrine needed to be reaffirmed and redefined. He contended that so long as Latin American countries did not align with extraregional anti-U.S. forces, the United States should not interfere in their internal affairs, and should instead focus its attention on migration issues. In August 2023, Vivek Ramaswamy, who aspired to be the Republican presidential candidate in 2024, also proposed a “modern Monroe Doctrine” plan combined with Nixonism. This proposal called on the United States to focus on homeland and Western Hemisphere security, while at the same time making major adjustments in U.S.–Russia relations and on the “Taiwan question.” 

(2) Trump’s Version of the “Monroe Doctrine”

The Trump administration has a long history with the Monroe Doctrine. In September 2018, Trump mentioned the Monroe Doctrine in a speech at the United Nations General Assembly, stating that, “It has been the formal policy of our country since President Monroe that we reject the interference of foreign nations in this hemisphere and in our own affairs.” During his first term, senior U.S. officials such as Rex Tillerson and John Bolton also repeatedly spoke highly of the Monroe Doctrine on various occasions. It can be said that the Trump administration has taken a positive and affirming stance toward the Monroe Doctrine. Against this backdrop, the Trump administration’s current regional policy has rejected moral reflection on the Monroe Doctrine, while at the same time inheriting its three principal meanings. 

First, there is an intense rejection of the influence of extraregional great powers in areas surrounding the United States, with the focus directed squarely at China. Officials in the current Trump administration have made many statements of this kind. For example, in an interview in February 2025, Marco Rubio remarked that “Let’s not wake up one day to find that China has more influence over our neighboring countries than we do, and that China has more presence in our neighboring countries than we do.” The commander of U.S. Southern Command, Alvin Holsey, likewise listed strategic competition with China as the foremost challenge within his area of responsibility in testimony before Congress. Since Trump took office, the United States has compelled Chinese companies to sell their port operations in Panama, and numerous senior officials have repeatedly smeared and criticized China–Latin America cooperation during visits to the region. All of this indicates that containing China’s influence has become a core component of U.S. policy toward Latin America. 

Second, the United States has not abandoned intervention in Latin American countries. Through means such as tariff wars, the Trump administration has compelled Latin American countries to cooperate with the United States on issues such as cracking down on illegal migrants, for example, by accepting migrants deported by the United States. In addition, the Trump administration has exerted pressure on certain left-wing forces in Latin America, including relisting Cuba as a “state sponsor of terrorism” and restricting transactions with Cuban enterprises. The Trump administration has also intervened in internal struggles between left- and right-wing forces within Latin American countries, such as by sanctioning former Argentine left-wing president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner on the grounds of “corruption.” 

Finally, U.S. policy toward Latin America exhibits a pronounced isolationist coloring. Isolationism emphasizes that international affairs have only limited relevance to U.S. interests, and that the United States is also constrained in its capacity to intervene in such affairs. Proceeding from this logic, the Trump administration has advocated a retrenchment of U.S. power toward the homeland and surrounding regions. Rubio stated that “in the realm of diplomacy, this [America First] means paying closer attention to our own neighborhood—the Western Hemisphere.” This indicates that the isolationist inclination of “America First” now serves as the point of departure for U.S. regional policy. 

(3) The Characteristics and Variables of the “New Monroe Doctrine”

Given the many elements historically contained in the Monroe Doctrine, it is difficult to say which of the Trump administration’s actions can fully break out of the doctrine’s existing framework. However, the Trump administration has indeed pushed some relatively marginal elements of the traditional Monroe Doctrine back to the forefront, thereby presenting a somewhat anomalous sense of “newness.” 

First, the logic of isolationism marks a break between the “New Monroe Doctrine” and the past. Although the Monroe Doctrine has long had affinities with isolationism, it has been a very long time since isolationism served as the primary logic of U.S. foreign policy. While Pat Buchanan once promoted isolationism by invoking the Monroe Doctrine, his views at the time did not rise to the level of U.S. foreign policy. From this perspective, an isolationist coloring constitutes a defining feature of Trump’s “New Monroe Doctrine.” Isolationism has led Trump to focus more closely on domestic issues such as illegal migration and the spread of drugs, to emphasize the United States’ status as a “victim,” and to regard certain neighboring countries as the sources of U.S. problems. This has meant that the objectives of U.S. regional policy are no longer limited to maintaining hegemony, but also include addressing domestic problems through diplomacy. The “victim” mindset has also altered the emotional tenor of U.S. policy toward Latin America. Because Trump views Latin America as a source of the United States’ domestic problems, his policy toward the region is infused with a certain sense of “retaliation,” and accordingly displays an even greater lack of respect, and even elements of deliberate humiliation. 

Second, the Trump administration’s version of the Monroe Doctrine displays a stronger territorial orientation and a pronounced “Western Hemisphere” character. Within the current Trump administration, the official who has explicitly invoked the Monroe Doctrine is Mike Waltz. In an interview given on the eve of the new administration’s inauguration, he included such items as combating drug trafficking, asserting control over the Panama Canal and Greenland, and renaming the Gulf of Mexico into what he termed the “Monroe Doctrine 2.0.” The defining feature of the “Monroe Doctrine 2.0” lies in its emphasis on direct control over strategic territories, while at the same time placing Greenland on the same footing as Latin America. Direct territorial expansion was more a theme of the 19th century, and Trump’s renewed clamoring for territorial annexation carries the flavor of “rehashing old ideas in new terms.” That Greenland, together with Canada and Panama, have simultaneously entered Trump’s expansionary field of vision also marks a departure from the traditional Monroe Doctrine. The Monroe Doctrine originally stated that the United States would not interfere with the Latin American colonies of European countries that had not yet achieved independence. In practice, therefore, it excluded territories such as Canada, which at the time belonged to the United Kingdom. Moreover, apart from President James K. Polk’s invocation of the Monroe Doctrine in the 19th century, which was somewhat related to boundary disputes between the United States and the United Kingdom in North America, all other U.S. government references to the Monroe Doctrine have primarily concerned Latin American countries to the south of the United States. Now, Mike Waltz’s inclusion of regions located to the north of the United States within the scope of the Monroe Doctrine reflects a characteristic tendency to treat Latin America as part of an integrated “single chessboard” encompassing the entire Western Hemisphere. Similar practices by the Trump administration have also had effects on regional international relations. For example, tariff wars against Mexico and Canada have in fact encouraged greater coordination and cooperation between these two countries. From an academic perspective, the Trump administration’s policy shift likewise calls on scholars studying different regions of the Western Hemisphere to strengthen communication and coordination. 

Of course, Trump’s “New Monroe Doctrine” has not yet taken its final shape. There are contradictions among the various objectives of its regional policy, resulting in uncertainties in its policy instruments. One such source of uncertainty lies in the “carrot” component that the “New Monroe Doctrine” offers allies, as well as in whether the “New Monroe Doctrine” will ultimately pursue a unilateralist path or a bloc-based alignment strategy. On the one hand, in order to maintain regional hegemony, the United States needs to court Latin American countries. During Trump’s first term, the Trump administration proposed the “Growth in the Americas” initiative in an effort to attract Latin American countries. With respect to different Latin American countries, the United States has more recently also dangled inducements such as production chain relocation and even the signing of free trade agreements. On the other hand, isolationist tendencies also require the United States to handle U.S.–Latin America relations from the perspective of domestic politics. This not only entails a strong aversion to providing regional public goods, but even involves demanding that Latin American countries make concessions of interests to the United States. We can see that there are many contradictions in current U.S. policy toward Latin America. For example, not long after Marco Rubio visited Guyana in late March 2025, the United States announced that it would impose so-called “reciprocal tariffs” of as high as 38 percent on products from Guyana. The United States has sought to entice Argentina with free trade agreements and the provision of exchange stabilization funds. However, when Argentine President Javier Milei traveled to the United States in early April, he was nevertheless unable to secure a meeting with Donald Trump. These contradictions may also reflect the fact that there are still differing views within the Trump administration on relevant issues. 

The “big stick” element of the “New Monroe Doctrine” likewise contains uncertainties. Although, in the short term, the Trump administration has not hesitated to apply high pressure to Latin American countries, a cost-conscious Trump administration also finds it difficult to accept the price required for forceful intervention in Latin American countries. Thus, while the Trump administration has indeed adopted high-pressure measures in the area of migrant repatriation, there remains uncertainty over just how forceful the Trump administration’s “big stick” will be on many other issues. For example, left-wing governments in Latin America have consistently opposed Trump, yet there are also flexible elements in Trump’s policies toward them. In 2017, Trump threatened that he would not rule out military action against the left-wing government of Venezuela, and implemented a policy of “maximum pressure” against Venezuela during his term. However, in Trump’s new term, although the United States has adopted a range of policies highly unfriendly toward Venezuela, it has nonetheless engaged in dialogue with the Venezuelan side on matters such as repatriating migrants to Venezuela and demanding the release of detained U.S. nationals. On the issue of imposing tariffs on Mexico, the Trump administration has also delayed action or even backed down at times. Whether the Trump administration’s many “big sticks” are backed by genuine follow-up measures or amount merely to bluffing is a question that merits close attention.