UAE National Day in Washington highlights $1 trillion future in US

PUBLISHED: December 3, 2025 | www.baltimoresun.com

On Tuesday evening, the Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium in Washington, D.C., glowed with Emirati colors. Inside its marble halls, diplomats, governors, senators and business leaders gathered to celebrate the 54th anniversary of the founding of the United Arab Emirates, and to show the strength between the United States and the United Arab Emirates as our two nations enter a new, high-stakes chapter.

Hosted by the UAE embassy, the reception drew a who’s who of policymakers: Maryland’s Deputy Secretary of Commerce Ricardo Benn and Secretary of State Susan Lee, Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, Iowa Sen. Joni Ernst, South Carolina Congressman Joe Wilson, Maryland Deputy Secretary of State Michael Lore, Special Assistant Alexandria Liu and media figures like CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer. And, of course, right at the center of it all was UAE Ambassador Yousef Al Otaiba.

For Maryland, this night marked the beginning of what might end up being a powerful relationship between the state and the UAE. Michael Lore and Alexandria Liu will be leading a delegation to the UAE from Dec. 8-12, followed immediately by a UAE-Maryland Trade Mission from Dec. 9-13 in coordination with the U.S. Department of Commerce.

And the timing could not be better. The UAE and the U.S. have begun to scale their economic partnership to historic levels. The two nations launched the UAE-U.S. Partnership for Accelerating Clean Energy (PACE) back in 2022, where $100 billion will be invested into deploying 100 gigawatts of clean energy by 2035. And on top of that, the UAE has announced that it will invest $1 trillion into the United States over the coming decade, as part of its broader $1.4 trillion investment strategy that will be focused on American infrastructure, clean energy, emerging technologies and advanced manufacturing. For states such as Maryland and agricultural states like Iowa, that kind of investment could transform their economies.

President Donald Trump has framed the UAE’s 10-year, $1.4 trillion investment commitment as evidence that his administration is drawing record levels of foreign capital into the United States. He has stated his commitment to use this capital to help fuel job growth, new factories and large-scale projects in artificial intelligence, and more. Emirati leaders, including President Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan and senior economic officials, have described the plan as a strong vote of confidence in the U.S. economy.

Sen. Ernst, a Republican from Iowa and a member of the Senate’s leadership, stated just how important the UAE has become to America and to international peace. “Our relationship with the UAE is extremely important,” she said. “They are one of the founding members of the Abraham Accords, which is really important for the stability and prosperity of the Middle East. They have been a leader when it comes to relations with Israel, and they’ve really set the stage not just for the Emiratis, but for other countries in the region to follow their lead.”

Congressman Wilson, a senior member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, discussed the geopolitical importance of the UAE. “We have a chance, because of Donald Trump, for peace for the first time in 3,000 years in the Middle East.”

It has become clear that the UAE-U.S. partnership has become an increasingly central part of America’s economic strategy, and it is one that officials in Washington recognize is only expected to grow in the years ahead.

Armstrong Williams (www.armstrongwilliams.com; @arightside) is a political analyst, syndicated columnist and owner of the broadcasting company, Howard Stirk Holdings. He is also part owner of The Baltimore Sun.

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