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August 14, 2025
Department of State for details about a rumored peace agreement ending the decades-long war between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
Transcripts of weekly media briefings show state department officials saying little but promising more information would come — a lot more.
On Aug. 8, the beans were spilled. President Donald Trump walked Armenian President Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to a long table at the White House, where all three men initialed a yet-to-be-ratified agreement for peace.
Scanning his audience of attendees, Trump singled out Secretary of State Marco Rubio and a U.S. senator not known, outside of his China experience, for his international chops: Montana’s Steve Daines.
“I see that we have (Energy Secretary) Chris Wright outside and Senator Steve Daines sitting right here. Thank you, Chris, thank you very much. And Steve, thank you very much,” Trump said.
Daines, who was invited to interview for this article, had been meeting with Armenians and Azerbaijanis since the spring. In June, he discussed critical minerals with Pashinyan in Gyumri, Armenia. In Baku, Azerbaijan, he talked about oil and gas with Aliyev. Those details come from meeting readouts.
Threaded through the peace agreement is a corridor across Armenian soil to connect Azerbaijan to an exclave, Nakhchivan, which had been separated by land taken by Armenia during the 35-year conflict between the two nations.
Per the agreement, the United States will control the corridor for 99 years and name it the TRIPP, short for Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity. It’s likely to be well-traveled by fossil fuels. Azerbaijan has oil and gas to move. The country’s state energy company, SOCAR, signed a development memorandum of cooperation with Exxon Mobil on June 2, the day before Daines met with Aliyev and Pashinyan.
Armenia, which doesn’t have its neighbor’s fossil fuel resources, blocks Azerbaijan’s route to Turkey and Black Sea shipping ports. Daines penned an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal ahead of the Aug. 8 peace agreement ceremony, emphasizing the potential to supply Azerbaijan oil and gas to Europe. Those sales would undermine Russia’s gas trade.
Always a promoter of American oil and gas interests, Daines ranked sixth among senators up for reelection in 2020, just behind then-Senate President Mitch McConnell, for contributions from employees of PACs affiliated with the industry.
“I look forward to that corridor, because that corridor says, I’m going to have to get over there,” Trump said. “I’ll bring Senator Daines with me. We’re going to have to get over there, Steve, because this is a really great achievement.”
That Montana’s two-term senator had a role in the peace deal surprised some. Punchbowl News, a D.C.-based subscription news service, led its “Daily Punch” discussion on the trade agreement with amazement about Daines playing a role.
“Who the hell knew that Steve Daines, who was, who is, a senator from Montana and was the chair of the NRSC, is also an international power broker?” said Jake Sherman, Punchbowl founder, speaking on The Daily Punch.
Daines joined the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations in January, following a two-year stint as director of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, the Republican Party’s official campaign committee for U.S. Senate races. The party regained control of the U.S. Senate after the 2024 elections.
With the foreign relations appointment, Daines became chairman of the Subcommittee on Europe and Regional Security Cooperation. Congressional delegation trips, also known as CODELs, to the South Caucasus followed. In addition to Armenia and Azerbaijan CODELs, Daines visited neighboring Georgia in May.
Three years ago, Daines traveled to Romania to meet with leaders of countries neighboring Ukraine. He wound up detouring to Kyiv for an impromptu trip with Rep. Victoria Spartz, R-Indiana, a Ukrainian native. Daines became one of the first members of Congress to visit the war zone, though he continued to oppose broad spending bills that included aid to Ukraine.
During Trump’s first term, Daines traveled to China four times, according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies. In 2017, he attempted to broker the sale of Montana beef to a large online grocer in China, but the agreement was scuttled months later by a tariff war launched by Trump, plus a change in leadership among parties in China negotiating the agreement.
Daines was also part of a CODEL to Russia in 2018 to meet with Russian leaders ahead of a visit between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin that August.
—Tom Lutey
A tale of two letters
A coalition of federal, state and local Republican politicians signed a letter on Aug. 4 supporting Gov. Greg Gianforte’s addition of Jessica Flint to the Criminal Justice Oversight Interim Committee. Flint is the state government relations manager for Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative legal organization.
The governor on July 18 removed the committee’s representative from ACLU of Montana and added Flint. That change caused seven Democratic legislators and 15 Montana advocacy organizations, including policy think tanks and civil rights advocates, to sign a letter along with Disability Rights Montana criticizing the governor’s decision.
The Republicans’ letter in response to that outcry included signatures from the federal delegation, most of the statewide elected officeholders, 18 state senators, 25 state representatives, a handful of local politicians and several members of CJOC.
Sean Southard, Gianforte’s director of communications, said the dueling letters will not likely change Flint’s committee membership.
“The law allows the governor to appoint a civil rights organization to the board that advocates for the best interests of all Montanans. And that’s exactly what he did,” Southard wrote in an Aug. 13 email to Capitolized. “With regard to the letter opposing this appointment, it’s fascinating to read a letter about alleged discrimination in which the groups who authored it openly urge the governor to discriminate against a Christian organization.”
David Carlson, executive director of Disability Rights Montana, said the Republican letter was an echo chamber.
“The response was simply [from] members of [Gianforte’s] own party who agree with him. I’m not surprised members of his own party agree with them. That’s what makes a party,” Carlson said in an Aug. 14 interview with Capitolized. “What I’m concerned with is the expertise of people who routinely work on civil rights issues in Montana not being heard.
“I’m not aware of significant concerns around religious discrimination in our correctional system or in our policing. If we have those concerns, we absolutely should work on them,” Carlson continued. “But I don’t think you throw out the 50-plus years of experience that comes to the table when ACLU Montana is there.”
Recently elected council Chair Sen. Barry Usher, R-Laurel, said he supports the appointment.
“It is a diverse group on purpose, to make sure that we can gather information from people’s backgrounds and hear their opinions from their backgrounds,” Usher said in an Aug. 13 interview with Capitolized. “So I think she’ll be a valuable asset.”
Usher said he doesn’t anticipate delays for the committee’s business.
“This back and forth with the letters — hopefully that’s just a side distraction and the group should be able to continue forward,” Usher said.
The group has met twice and plans during its next meeting to finalize topics to investigate during the interim before the 2027 legislative session.
ADF did not respond to requests for comment.
— Zeke Lloyd
