No, the U.S. does not have any authority over the Panama Canal

During his Jan. 20 inaugural speech, President Donald Trump spoke of sweeping changes coming in his second term, including a desire to retake control of the Panama Canal.

The Panama Canal is a man-made waterway that cuts through central Panama for 51 miles, using a system of locks and reservoirs to connect the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. This route saves ships from traveling an extra 7,000 miles around South America’s Cape Horn.

Trump claimed Panama is imposing “ridiculous” fees on ships passing through this vital waterway.

“American ships are being severely overcharged and not treated fairly in any way shape or form. And that includes the United States Navy … We gave [the Panama Canal] to Panama, and we’re taking it back,” Trump said. 

Following Trump’s comments, Google search data shows there’s been a spike in searches of people asking which country has authority over the Panama Canal. 

THE QUESTION

Does the U.S. have any authority over the Panama Canal?

THE SOURCES

• Panama Canal Authority
• The Embassy of Panama
• U.S. Department of State’s Office of the Historian
• U.S. Census Bureau
• The Library of Congress
• Panamanian President José Raúl Mulino
• GovInfo, a service of the United States Government Publishing Office that provides free public access to official publications from all three branches of the federal government
• Jorge Luis Quijano, the Panama Canal administrator from 2014 to 2019,
• Benjamin Gedan, Ph.D., director of the Latin America Program at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C.

THE ANSWER

No, the U.S. does not have any authority over the Panama Canal, but it used to.

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WHAT WE FOUND

The U.S. does not have any authority over the Panama Canal. The waterway, which was built by the U.S. in the early 1900s, opened in 1914 and remained under U.S. government control until treaties signed in 1977 by President Jimmy Carter set terms for its eventual transfer to Panama. The two countries jointly operated the canal until December 1999, after which Panama assumed full control.

On Dec. 22, in response to Trump’s comments, Panamanian President José Raúl Mulino posted a video on X declaring that “every square meter of the canal belongs to Panama and will continue to belong” to his country.

Without mentioning Trump by name, Mulino addressed the president-elect’s complaints over rising fees for ships crossing the canal, saying they are set by experts who take into account operational costs, and supply and demand factors.

“The tariffs are not set on a whim,” Mulino said. He noted that Panama has expanded the canal over the years to increase ship traffic “on its own initiative,” and added that shipping fee increases help pay for improvements.

“Panamanians may have different views on many issues, but when it comes to our canal, and our sovereignty, we will all unite under our Panamanian flag,” Mulino said.

A little over an hour later, Trump responded to Mulino’s remarks on Truth Social, saying: “We’ll see about that!” He also posted a picture of a U.S. flag planted in the canal zone under the phrase, “Welcome to the United States Canal!”

The Panama Canal’s history

An effort to establish a canal through Panama began with the French in 1880, but financial troubles made the initiative fail after nearly nine years of little progress, according to the Embassy of Panama in the United States.

Malaria, yellow fever and other tropical diseases devastated a workforce that was already struggling with especially dangerous terrain and harsh working conditions in the jungle. These conditions eventually cost more than 20,000 lives by some estimates, the U.S. Department of State’s Office of the Historian says on its website.

At this time, Panama was a province of Colombia, which refused to ratify a subsequent 1901 treaty licensing U.S. interests to build the Panama Canal. President Theodore Roosevelt responded to Colombia’s refusal by dispatching U.S. warships to Panama’s Atlantic and Pacific coasts.

The U.S. also pre-wrote a constitution that would be ready after Panamanian independence, which gave American forces “the right to intervene in any part of Panama, to re-establish public peace and constitutional order.” In part because Colombian troops were unable to traverse harsh jungles, Panama declared an effectively bloodless independence within hours on Nov. 3, 1903.

The newly-declared Republic of Panama soon signed the Hay-Bunau-Varilla Treaty of 1903, which provided the U.S. with a 10-mile wide strip of land for the canal, a one-time $10 million payment to Panama, and an annual annuity of $250,000. The U.S. also agreed to guarantee the independence of Panama, according to the Office of the Historian.

After more than a decade of construction, the U.S. finished building the canal on Aug. 15, 1914. Almost immediately, some Panamanians began questioning the validity of U.S. control of the canal, which led to what became known in the country as the “generational struggle” to take it over.

The U.S. annulled its right to intervene in Panama in the 1930s. By the 1970s, with its administrative costs sharply increasing, the U.S. government spent years negotiating with Panama to cede control of the waterway.

The Carter administration worked with the government of Omar Torrijos, and the two sides eventually decided that their best chance for ratification was to submit two treaties to the U.S. Senate, the “Permanent Neutrality Treaty” and the “Panama Canal Treaty.”

The first, which continues in perpetuity, gives the U.S. the right to act to ensure the canal remains open and secure. The second stated that the U.S. would turn over the canal to Panama on Dec. 31, 1999. Both were signed in 1977 and ratified the following year. 

“At noon on December 31, 1999, Panama took over full operation, administration and maintenance of the Canal, in compliance with the Torrijos-Carter Treaties negotiated with the United States in 1977,”  said the Embassy of Panama. “The waterway is now managed by the Panama Canal Authority, an autonomous government entity.”

Jorge Luis Quijano, who served as the Panama Canal’s administrator from 2014 to 2019, says the neutrality treaty does give the U.S. the right to act if the canal’s operation is threatened due to military conflict — but not to reassert control.

“There’s no clause of any kind in the neutrality agreement that allows for the taking back of the canal,” Quijano told the Associated Press. “Legally, there’s no way, under normal circumstances, to recover territory that was used previously.”

Benjamin Gedan, director of the Latin America Program at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C., agrees.

“There’s very little wiggle room, absent a second U.S. invasion of Panama, to retake control of the Panama Canal in practical terms,” Gedan said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

This story is also available in Spanish / Lee este artículo también en español: No, los EE.UU. no tienen ninguna autoridad sobre el Canal de Panamá