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The relationship between Algeria and the United States has always been complex since the establishment of the Algerian state in 1962. Although the two nations have continuously attempted to develop strong diplomatic relations, significant multilateral and bilateral divergences persist.
These differences are particularly pronounced due to Algeria’s close military and diplomatic relations with Russia and its historical stance on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which even led to a diplomatic rupture with the U.S. during the 1967 Israeli-Arab War.
More recently, the Algerian-American relationship has continued to decline in intensity and agreement, largely due to American recognition of Morocco’s sovereignty over its southern provinces and the close alignment of the U.S. and its Western allies with Morocco.
Despite ongoing exchanges on critical issues such as counterterrorism and economic cooperation, geopolitical differences remain pronounced. These complexities highlight the challenges in forging a consistently cooperative relationship, as the US and Algeria navigate their divergent strategic interests and alliances on the global stage.
More specifically, the state of these diplomatic relations demonstrates the failure of Algeria’s policy towards the U.S., namely its weak and misguided lobbying strategy.
Indeed, as recent developments on the Sahara question have shown, Algeria’s attempts to undermine Morocco’s rapidly growing diplomatic momentum have been largely ineffective and counterproductive.
Algerian Lobbying Efforts and Spending Patterns
From 2016 to 2020, the Algerian government spent a total of $2,184,308 on lobbying in the United States. The year 2018 marked the highest expenditure with $810,000, reflecting a significant peak in the Algerian regime’s lobbying efforts in Washington.
However, from 2018 to 2020, there was a notable decline in spending. By 2020, the amount had dropped to $120,000, representing an 85 percent reduction from the 2018 peak. No data has been recorded for the years 2021, 2022, or 2023, indicating a pause in spending as legal lobbying must be reported and available to the public. This trend suggests that after a significant surge in 2018, Algeria scaled back its lobbying efforts over the following two years.
Other than the transactions made by the Algerian government, all other transactions concerning Algeria have been carried out by registrant Elisabeth Meyers.
She has been particularly active in the past two years, defending and supporting the cause of the Movement for the Independence of Kabylie. This significant focus on Kabyle independence in recent Algeria-related lobbying efforts highlights a fundamentally unwelcome development for the Algerian regime.
Key Players and Lobbying Strategies
Algeria has largely relied upon and signed lobbying contracts with only two firms in the past 10 years: Keene Consulting, and Foley Hoag LLP.
Of these, Foley Hoag LLP secured the most significant contract. Signed before 2016, this contract was aimed at supporting Algeria’s diplomatic position, particularly concerning Polisario’s independence claims in Morocco’s southern provinces. However, this partnership was suspended at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the contract was not renewed after it expired on March 31, 2021.
Foley Hoag, a law firm headquartered in Boston with offices in New York, Paris, and Washington, D.C., represents public and private clients in a wide range of disputes and transactions worldwide.
In making sense of Algeria’s rather perplexing choice not to renew the partnership, one plausible interpretation would be that the country has decided to shift its diplomatic and military focus to Russia.
In addition to Foley Hoag, Keene Consulting also played a significant role in Algeria’s lobbying efforts. As a foreign agent for Algeria, David Keene, a former president of the National Rifle Association and chairman of the American Conservative Union, made sure to use his extensive GOP connections to advocate for Algerian interests in the U.S.
Keene has received substantial payments from the Algerian government since 2018 and has approached numerous U.S. officials, including members of Congress, White House aides, and Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, to lobby on behalf of Algiers.
A notable point in Keene’s lobbying for Algeria remains a meeting with his friend John Bolton, a former National Security Advisor under President Trump and one of the leading anti-Morocco voices in the US.
This meeting took place shortly after Bolton expressed frustration with the unresolved conflict between Morocco and the Algerian-backed separatist Polisario Front over Morocco’s southern provinces. Keene’s history with the Algerian government dates back to 2006-2008, when he previously lobbied on behalf of the country, underscoring his long-standing ties to the Algerian establishment.
Keene was even granted a meeting with former Vice President Mike Pence to discuss Morocco’s sovereignty over its southern provinces. But Algeria was ultimately disappointed when, just months after this meeting, the Trump White House dealt a devastating blow to Algiers’ diplomacy on the Sahara dossier by officially endorsing Morocco’s sovereignty over its southern provinces.
In a sense, the sorry state of Algeria’s dwindling influence in Washington highlights the country’s ineffective use of lobbying. Instead of advancing its economic interests or using the resources it derives from its vast energy reserves to address some of its persistent, decades-long socio-political crises, Algeria’s actions on the continental and world stage seem more focused on smearing Morocco and underscoring Morocco’s territorial integrity.
To put it differently, Algeria’s lobbying in the US is essentially focused on its political feud with Morocco — a regrettable misuse of resources. This strategic choice is bound to be tragic in the long run, as it reflects a disturbing trend of lobbying efforts being disproportionately devoted to political disputes rather than promoting economic and social progress.
Death of Algerian Influence within the American political landscape
Despite these efforts, Algeria’s lobbying efforts over the past few years have lacked any notable edge. And with no meaningful results to show for all the anti-Morocco bluster its paid American spinmen deployed in the aftermath of the Trump White House’s recognition of Moroccan sovereignty over the Sahara, the Algerian government has decided to sign no contract with lobbying firms since the suspension of its deal with Foley Hoag.
This newfound attitude suggests Algeria now harbors doubts about the effectiveness of its lobbying in the US, especially considering the clear disappearance of any sort of Algerian influence within the U.S. political landscape. In this sense, the recent death of Senator Jim Inhofe, who was once the fiercest and most influential American advocate of the Polisario Front’s separatist aspirations, could not have come at a worse time for Algeria’s declining influence in Washington.
While lobbying remained one of the ways Algeria hoped to rewrite the history of the Sahara dispute, the repeated blows its diplomacy has sustained over recent months and years should be enough to make it clear to the Algerian regime that the creation of an independent state in southern Morocco is an impossible dream.
After Bolton, Inhofe, and other pro-Polisario Washington power brokers miserably failed to convince the Trump administration to float support for a self-determination referendum in Sahara, Algeria’s hope was sustained by the belief that subsequent US administrations would reconsider Trump’s December 10 proclamation.
To Algiers’s utter dismay, however, recent developments suggest that such a reversal of fortunes will not be on Wahsington’s agenda for the foreseeable future. Even if it has particularly implemented the December 10 proclamation with the same gusto and resolve that Trump exuded while announcing it, the Biden administration has consistently poured cold water on Algeria and Polisario hopes by signaling its commitment to Morocco’s Autonomy Plan.
Indeed, judging by the steady decline it has experienced since Morocco’s return to the AU in early 2017 and the U.S. recognition of Moroccan sovereignty in late 2020, it would not be an exaggeration to say that the past half-decade has marked the beginning of the end of a 50-year Algerian campaign to undermine Morocco’s sovereignty over its southern provinces.
Algerian Failure in the Face of Moroccan Diplomatic Strength
But this should not be an excuse for Morocco to rest on its laurels and enjoy its seemingly irreversible diplomatic victory on the intricate Sahara issue.
For if anything, the deep-rooted nature of Algeria’s obsession with Morocco and the realist constraints of the tragic rivalry in which the two neighbors have been mired for the past six decades mean that the Algerian establishment will not allow its dwindling diplomatic firepower to lose any more proverbial ground to Morocco without a fight.
This is why advocacy, diplomacy, and strategic resource management will remain important as the two neighboring countries prepare for the next phase in their strategic competition. Morocco, to be sure, is so far winning the diplomatic battle over the status of the Sahara. While Algeria’s attempts at lobbying have been largely ineffective, Rabat has navigated its multifaceted challenges with a combination of diplomacy, economic strategies, and cultural outreach.
The ineffectiveness of Algerian diplomacy has not only been evident in lobbying and political engagement efforts in the US but also Algeria’s broader international efforts. The country’s difficulties are visible in various international scenes, such as the European Union parliament in Strasbourg, the African Union headquarters in Addis Ababa, and the United Nations General Assembly in New York.
By comparison, Morocco has in the past decade shifted its focus to bilateral engagement with a wide range of states and corporate actors to achieve significant gains across various sectors. New investment deals with, and a newfound diplomatic outreach to, both traditional and new partners have advanced the kingdom’s development, peace, and prosperity.
Indeed, Morocco’s growing influence has positioned it as a leading player in Africa, enhancing its role as a close ally of the United States. This newfound continental assertiveness is an essential asset in Morocco’s relations with global powers such as the United States, China, Russia, and the United Kingdom — all of which have signaled that they view the North African kingdom as an important partner for the success of their respective strategies of strategic engagement with Africa in the coming years.
On a more general level, another clear sign of the Algerian defeat in the diplomatic dispute with Morocco over the Sahara is the present state of international support for the Polisario Front’s self-proclaimed “Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic.” As of today, 46 countries out of the 193 UN states recognize the self-proclaimed entity.
Not only does this figure indicate a low level of international support for the Algerian-sponsored separatist movement, but perhaps the most telling thing is that the countries that still support Polisario are former allies of the Soviet Union who have not outgrown the ideological divides that once reigned supreme in a now-defunct world order.
But even more interestingly, Russia, a close ally of Algeria and the proverbial leader of the ideological world order in which the Polisario and its main backers have been stuck for the past four decades, now adopts a position of constructive neutrality on the Sahara dispute. What’s more, out of the original 84 countries that once recognized the “SADR,” 38 have withdrawn their recognition over the past few decades.
These waves of reversal reflect a significant shift in the international consensus over the Sahara, especially following the introduction of the 2007 Moroccan autonomy plan which is today backed by the UN Security Council as the best roadmap for a lasting resolution.
Read also: Why Algeria Is Alarmed by Morocco’s Growing Ties with Ethiopia
By reassessing their positions, the Polisario Front’s former allies have chosen to align themselves with what they now present as a vision of lasting stability, achievable peace, and constructive dialogue within the framework of the Moroccan autonomy plan.
During a recent vote at the African Union, 52 out of 54 members decided to exclude the Polisario group from the AU’s meetings with other international institutions and states. These critical defeats highlight a significant issue: Algerian diplomacy has not only faltered in the U.S. but has also failed on a global scale.
In its obsession to undermine Morocco’s development, prosperity, and sovereignty, Algerian diplomacy has led the country to squander opportunities and create adverse outcomes. This has inadvertently garnered more support for Morocco’s legitimate and historical claims, as opposed to Algeria’s fabricated and discredited claims associated with the Polisario Front.
All of this explains why Algerian diplomacy, in pursuing misguided goals and refusing to adapt to the reality of changing dynamics in the regional and global scene, has lamentably failed to create a satellite state in southern Morocco.
And now that even France has recognized Morocco’s sovereignty over the Sahara, the overwhelming consensus among observers is that it is only a matter of time before other reluctant and Polisario-friendly countries finally concede that it is both politically unfeasible and disastrous to create a new state in southern Morocco.
