US Vice President Joseph David Vance is expected to visit Nairobi on 24 November 2025. When he lands in Kenya, on an official visit that ends on November 27th 2025, President Donal Trump’s deputy will have a full in-tray.
JD Vance will find an uneasy ally that has been to bed with the Chinese, America’s loudest and most aggressive trade arch rival and a critical Nairobi-Mombasa Highway project that was cancelled by Dr William Ruto’s administration in August this year,
The Nairobi-Mombasa Superhighway was to be undertaken through a Public Private Partnership(PPP) model, with American Everstrong Capital as the lead investment manager. Others involved in the project, estimated to cost KSh 468 billion (US$ 3.6 Billion) and to be completed in 2030, were American Development Finance Institutions. Kenya pension funds, insurance firms and banks, were also to invest in the project through Pack Hunters Club consortium.
US on the verge of losing out on the Nairobi-Mombasa Highway Project
This project is now back to the drawing board after it was rejected by the PPP Committee on grounds that it failed to meet set feasibility criteria. The Committee also wants the existing road network to be expanded and upgraded instead of doing an entirely new road. Everstrong Capital has the option of submit a revised proposal for fresh consideration.
US Vice President Vance is also visiting Nairobi when Kenya’s export industry is restless and staring at possible job losses after losing preferential access to the American market under the African Growth and Opportunity Act(AGOA) trade arrangements. Kenya and USA have yet to find an alternative bilateral trade agreement.
Kenya, one a dominant regional giant, is also a sight of its former self, facing fierce competition for business and trade opportunities from its neighbours. Ethiopia’s economy is now the fastest growing in the Eastern Africa region, while South Africans are hovering the skies for sight of any low-lying fruits in the country’s booming banking business.
Vance’s visit, which will last till 27 November, will be the first such high level mission to Nairobi under President Donald Trump’s second administration.
Washington has been uncomfortable with growing influence of the Chinese over Nairobi, its vital listening post against al-Shabaab extremism and other religious fundamentals prowling the Indian Ocean coastline.
US-Kenya Bilateral Trade Agreement Standoff
The African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), which offered duty-free access for Kenyan exports to the US, expired in September. Trump’s punitive 10% tax on imports into the American Market, threatens to throw thousands in Kenya’s Export Processing Zones(EPZs)out of work and livelihoods.
With an inward-looking and protectionist Trump Administration, it is unlikely that the AGOA window will be reopened or even a new trade agreement signed between Washington and Nairobi before year-end. Meanwhile, coffee, tea and textile exports to America from Kenya just got more expensive.
According to Available Trade Data upto July 2025, Total American Exports to Kenya was $ 612.1m against imports from Kenya which stood at $ 477.9m, leaving a trade balance of $ 134.2 m in favour of the US.
In 2024, Kenya exported textile, tea and coffee worth $737m into America, a position that will change drastically as the Trump tariffs kick in.
Vance is expected to review progress on a new Memorandum of Understanding between Nairobi and the American Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), targeting Indian Ocean narcotics routes increasingly linked to Somali and South Asian syndicates.
For America, these criminal enterprises are a menacing threat and a potential link with jihadist and other organised unlawful ecosystems, a must watch for intelligence teams monitoring illicit transnational flows.
Beijing’s Growing Influence in Nairobi
While Vance will be keen on trade and securing the East African region against extremist and criminal drug rings, the elephant in the room is China.
Beijing’s presence in Kenya has grown bigger, more visible and aggressive. China bankrolls the Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) project, including its expansion to the Ugandan border, finances roads and energy projects and increasingly competes for influence within Kenya’s corridors of power.
Some of the most notable American companies in Kenya include Del Monte Kenya, Mars Wrigley Confectionary Limited in Machakos, Microsoft, Starlink, JP Morgan, Google, Cigna, Abbot Laboratories, American Tower Corporation and Corteva among others.
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