Daines Joins Special Envoy Steve Witkoff in NYC, Touts Administration’s Peace Efforts in Central Asia and South Caucasus

WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senator Steve Daines joined Special Envoy Steve Witkoff for an event with the Board of Peace during the United Nations General Assembly in New York City. Read highlights below. Watch the full exchange HERE. Daines on his involvement with Central Asia: I remember the book The Global Chess Board that Dr. Brzezinski wrote back in the late 1990s. And he observed back then of the important interconnection between certainly Central Asia and the South Caucases. And you’ve all heard the analogy, but I took it from Brzezinski book about if we could find a way to pop the cork of the South Caucases, it would unleash the wine from Central Asia. And that’s a picture of something I could understand. And somebody who loved geography and history, even though I was trained in engineering, I loved the arts. When you take a look at a map and look at the geopolitical complexity of the region where our dear friends here live, it says if we could find ways to bring peace and to stabilize that part of the world, the prosperity that would be gained by Central Asia, the South Caucases and frankly throughout the world is something worth pursuing. And so it began years ago. But one of the challenges, Areyh, is that senators just don’t get over there that often. In fact, I was shocked when I started traveling in the region how infrequent the visits were from members of Congress. And yes, it’s a ways away, but it’s not that hard to get to at the end of the day. It’s just a matter of will and priority. And once we started to engage, we realized that this is a part of the world that wants to have a relationship in a more significant way with the United States. It was our problem of not making that easy. The Central Asia, South Caucases were leaning in. We just weren’t showing up. We started to show up, started to develop those relationships, hear the concerns and the issues on the ground there, and it started to gain momentum. And of course, look at this room today. This is just incredible. Daines on establishing peace between Armenia and Azerbaijan: Well first of all, let’s give credit where credit’s due. Honestly, what Steve Witkoff began, what you began is something that I started to see and to you all’s credit, you brought me along into that process. So I can’t take the credit for any of this. The credit goes to those in the room truly, but it was yourself and Steve Witkoff and John Askonas that started to frame something that could be very, very special. And I remember that first breakfast we had in Baku and we had the meeting with the President and it went very well. You could just tell there were common values and the most important currency in diplomacy is trust. It’s trust and that’s on a human level. And after completing the travels through the South Caucases, the Central Asia, meeting every one of the leaders, I remember I come back home and see my sweet wife Cindy and I’d say, “Cindy, these are really special relationships. These are leaders who want to foster this relationship with the United States and there’s trust building at this moment.” And I tell you, I couldn’t believe from those early conversations we had in Baku and then in Yerevan in May of 2025. Remarkable. And I’ll tell you, President Trump was the key linchpin in that because I know prior leaders had tried to figure out a way to navigate through the complexities and the difficult history with Azerbaijan and Armenia and we as Americans had to be very respectful of difficult decades if not going back further. And what I found is there needed to be somebody that could be trusted to help bring those hands together that Steve Wikcoff talked about and that was President Trump. and to his credit brought the leaders in Armenia and Azerbaijan to come together to come to Washington on August 8th to sign that important memorandum. That was something I’ll never ever forget. ### Contact: Gabby Wiggins