Following the resignation of Daniel Foote, the Special Envoy to Haiti of the Biden Administration Wendy Sherman, Assistant Secretary of State Wendy Sherman, the second senior official of the State Department, rejected the criticisms of Foote who appears in his resignation letter https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34820-haiti-flash-us-special-envoy-to-haiti-daniel-foote-resigns.html

Sherman said Thursday, September 23 in an interview with "McClatchy" that political disagreements with Foote had persisted throughout his tenure and whether or not whether or not to send US military troops to Haiti was a central dispute.

Sherman rejected Foote's claim that his recommendations were ignored "There have been multiple senior-level policy conversations on Haiti where all proposals, including those led by Special Envoy Foote, were fully considered in a rigorous and transparent policy process. Quite frankly, some of those proposals were harmful to our commitment to the promotion of democracy in Haiti. For him to say the proposals were ignored were, I'm sad to say, simply false."

Adding "one of the ideas that Mr. Foote had was to send the U.S. military back to Haiti [...] I have followed Haiti since the Clinton administration, and I can tell you that sending the U.S. military into Haiti is not the answer that will solve the terrible situation that the Haitian people are currently facing. It just was a bad idea."

Meanwhile, the disagreements between Foote and US Ambassador to Haiti Michèle Sison were well known in Port-au-Prince adding "We have tremendous faith in her [Sison] and in her leadership"

Recall that the Assistant Secretary for Western Hemisphere Affairs, Brian Nichols, will visit Haiti next week with Juan Gonzalez, Senior Director for Western Hemisphere Affairs at the National Security Council https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34820-haiti-flash-us-special-envoy-to-haiti-daniel-foote-resigns.html

""I think that Assistant Secretary Nichols will work with Ambassador Sison, and listening to civil society to see what we can do to help make the judgments to get to a free and fair election as soon as possible for the Haitian people," said Sherman "Sison and Nichols will assess in the coming weeks whether it is feasible for Haiti to hold free and fair elections this year."

For her part, Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, told reporters the same day that Foote had not expressed his concerns about the treatment of Haitian migrants at the border while he was on duty and that his criticisms were not specific.

See also :

https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-34820-haiti-flash-us-special-envoy-to-haiti-daniel-foote-resigns.html

S/ HaïtiLibre