The Trump administration is pushing an unprecedented reorganization of the US State Department that would sharply diminish America’s diplomatic presence across the globe, with deep cuts to embassies and consulates in Africa, Canada, and elsewhere. If implemented, the plan would be the most extensive overhaul of the department since its founding in 1789, marking a retreat from the multilateral diplomacy Washington promoted during the 20th century.
The proposal, in a leaked 16-page draft executive order, calls for the dismantling of crucial bureaus dealing with areas including climate policy, refugee coordination, global women’s issues, and democracy promotion. Among the offices targeted for abolition are the Bureau of African Affairs and the US mission to the United Nations. The reorganization would also reduce diplomatic relations with Canada, with fewer staff dealing with North American Affairs directly under the Secretary of State’s purview.
In Africa, several embassies and consulates would be closed, operations being consolidated into four regional bureaus- Indo-Pacific, Latin America, the Middle East, and Eurasia. Foreign service officers would not rotate around the world but stay in assigned regions for the length of their careers.
Furthermore, the plan also suggests converting the Fulbright Program into a narrower initiative with more focused national security studies, eliminating diversity, equity, and inclusion programs throughout the department. The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) would also be integrated into a new Bureau of Humanitarian Affairs, and all missions would need presidential approval.
A planned new foreign service test would evaluate diplomats’ allegiance to the president’s foreign policy agenda, representing a deviation toward political devotion in the once-non-partisan diplomatic corps.
This risky strategy, should it come into force, would profoundly change the US diplomacy and scale down its foreign presence.
