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Trump’s summit with West African leaders starts Wednesday without the Sahel region's largest economy over tariff threats and China concerns 

Fresh off brokering a peace deal between Rwanda and the Congo, President Donald Trump is set to hold his first 'America First' Africa Summit next week to advance commercial ties with five West African nations and secure critical minerals for the United States. Trump's huddle invitation is high-stakes for the Presidents of Senegal, Liberia, Gabon, Mauritania, and Guinea-Bissau, who need American investment and support to help battle jihadism, drug trafficking, and Wagner-backed coups spreading throughout the West African Sahel region. Left off the invite list is Ivory Coast, the Sahel region's largest economy.

At issue are Ivory Coast's threats in response to Trump’s Liberation Day tariffs that singled out Ivory Coast versus other West African states with a rate of 21%, and Ivory Coast's betrayal of commitments made under Trump's first administration, with Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick blasting the Ivorian President Alassane Ouattara for embracing China’s Huawei spy tech. 

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The day after President Trump announced a 90 day pause on his Liberation Day tariffs, the country's Agriculture Minister organized a press conference, where he threatened to use export controls to make cocoa more expensive for America if the Liberation Day tariffs proposed by the President go into effect.

In response, a letter from Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, shows Trump’s lead trade enforcer demanding the cocoa king Ivory Coast President Alassane Ouattara revive a $50 million Trump-era traffic management system, started in 2019 to unclog Abidjan’s streets and provide data for American investors but stalled under Biden’s incompetence, now eclipsed by Huawei’s $100 million Safe City surveillance tech with license plate detection cameras surveilling everyday people. 

Ivory Coast's welching on its past commitment to Trump's lead commercial dealmaker Commerce Under Secretary for International Trade Gilbert Kaplan, and ignoring White House prodding during a failed March trip to Washington by the Ivorian President's chief of staff Fidele Sarassoro pleading for security assistance, has convinced Trump administration officials it’s a lost cause for U.S. mineral investments. America’s offering opportunity and prosperity, but Ivory Coast is firmly in China’s grip. 

Trump vs. China’s Spy Tech

Trump’s Africa policy, shunning nations that favor China’s grip over their critical infrastructures, blocks Ivory Coast from investment opportunities and the security guarantees that come with them, while a travel ban on Ivorian officials is “on the table,” a State Department insider warned.

Huawei’s been invading the Ivorian public sector and key utilities since 2017, snagging broadband, 5G, and e-education deals, trade officials say. Its $100 million Safe City project, already implemented in African countries including South Africa, Uganda, and Zambia, is a “debt trap” and spy hub piling on Ivory Coast’s crushing debt. Beijing calls it “win-win cooperation,” with an Ivorian official claiming, “Huawei’s helping us grow, no strings attached.” But left unsaid are whispers of Huawei slipping bribes to African officials to lock in deals, as The Wall Street Journal exposed in Uganda and Zambia.

According to Commerce officials, the U.S. system successfully piloted in 2019 promised to cut Abidjan’s gridlock, boost safety, and spark investment growth, but Ivory Coast switched to Huawei’s surveillance tech, ignoring the White House’s request, and proving itself a French-Chinese vassal state unfit for America’s mineral deals. 

Trump’s Aid Trashed, No Reciprocity

Trump’s first term gifted Ivory Coast a $525 million Millennium Challenge Corporation grant for ports, roadways, and the Koumassi bridge, opened last month in Abidjan for 50,000 daily commuters, but Ouattara trashed the gesture by pausing the project he had greenlit in 2019 as a sign of reciprocity, fueling America's rage. Lutnick is cranking up the pressure, warning Ivory Coast to ditch Huawei’s spy tech and start playing ball or face economic ruin.