As Haiti’s leaders in a U.S.-backed transition continue to be divided over the fate of the country’s foreign minister, a visiting U.S. delegation on Wednesday made the administration’s position clear: “country over party.”

“Haiti would really benefit from having all of the current government officials to continue to put country over party and deliver on the promises to work for all Haitians,” a senior Biden administration official told the Miami Herald about the message he and other members of the high-level delegation delivered during their daylong visit to Port-au-Prince.

“We think it’s important that there’s a pathway forward where these different Haitian political actors can work together constructively and also put together a unified front to the international community.”

The latest political divisions in Haiti have the country’s leaders resembling children fighting over the same toy and has led to a standoff between both sides after Prime Minister Garry Conille on Tuesday refused a demand from the Transitional Presidential Council to fire Foreign Minister Dominique Dupuy.

Their beef: two incidents during the U.N. Security Council General Assembly in which council member Leslie Voltaire, now president of the body, was shut out of bilateral meetings with Brazil and the Dominican Republic, and Dupuy’s staunch criticism of the Dominican Republic’s decision to deport up to 10,000 Haitians a week.

Not mincing words, she has called the policy discriminatory and a violation of Haitians’ human rights. That has not gone down well with Voltaire and other members of the ruling presidential body, who have found her stance and language too harsh and want her replaced. After Conille refused, the presidential body canceled a Wednesday council of ministers’ meeting with the prime minister and his cabinet.

The U.S. official would not say what exactly was the message passed to members of the council, which has been enshrined in a corruption and bribery scandal after three of its members were referred for criminal persecution following an investigation. However, other sources said U.S. officials lectured members of the council and made clear their support for Dupuy. Council members were told to focus on addressing the country’s myriad of challenges including a deepening hunger and security crisis.

The high-level six-member U.S. delegation was led by Principal Deputy National Security Advisor Jon Finer and included Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Western Hemisphere Affairs Dan Erikson and Assistant Secretary for the Western Hemisphere Brian Nichols. They were joined by the acting assistant administrator for the U.S. Agency for International Development, Michael Camilleri, Department of Defense MSS Interagency Working Group Executive Director John Manza and the U.S. ambassador to Haiti, Dennis Hankins.

The senior administration official who spoke with the Herald said the delegation was asked about the U.S.’s stance on the mass deportations from the Dominican Republic, which has cited an “excess” of Haitian immigrants. U.S. officials reiterated that they’ve urged their “Dominican partners to address the humanitarian needs of Haitian migrants,” the official said.

“We’re aware this challenge of repatriating Haitians from the Dominican Republic is putting a new strain and stress on the Haitian government, and so we wanted to make sure they knew that we were tracking this issue closely, and are and have engaged the Dominican side,” he added.

The U.S. delegation arrived in Port-au-Prince on board a U.S. aircraft around 9 a.m. They then held separate discussions with the presidential council and senior Haitian government officials including Conille and Dupuy, the foreign minister. They also met with the leadership of the Haiti National Police, the Kenya-led Multinational Security Support, MSS, mission and members of the foreign diplomatic corps.

The main purpose of the trip was to underscore the United States’ commitment to support Haiti’s efforts to restore security and pave the way toward free and fair elections, the official said, emphasizing that delegation members are concerned about when a nine-member Provisional Electoral Council will finally be seated and sworn-in to begin organizing elections due next year.

“We wanted to ensure that the Transitional Presidential Council and the other Haitian institutions were working well together and able to present a unified front,” the official said. “We also underscored our commitment to rally international support to provide the Haitian National Police and the Multinational Security Support mission the tools they need to restore security and rule of law in Haiti. The U.S. is very committed to building a foundation of security and bringing hope to Haitians who are seeking to live their lives peacefully and free of violence.”

Earlier this week, Haiti National Police said a joint operation with the Kenya-led MSS mission had resulted in about 20 fatalities of gang members and injury to one of the leaders of the country’s most powerful gangs, Kraze Baryè gang, whose territory includes the area where the U.S. embassy is situated. The gang leader, known simply as “Deshommes” is second-in-command and was shot in Torcelle, a community southeast of the capital.

The operations took place on Saturday and Monday, and will continue, police said, adding that they confiscated weapons, ammunition and equipment belonging to gang members. During the operations, one of the U.S. armored vehicles belonging to the MSS was set ablaze by the gang after police were forced to abandon the vehicle due to engine failure.

Both Deshommes and the gang’s leader, Vitel’homme Innocent, who is the subject of a $2 million FBI bounty, remain at large.

The first major incursion involving the Kenya-led security forces, which also have members of the Jamaican and Belize military, comes on the heels of one of the worst gang massacres in recent memory. At least 115 people were killed in the central Haiti town of Pont-Sondé on Oct. 3 when gangs in the rural Artibonite region launched a middle-of-the-night assault on unsuspecting residents.

The attack, the senior Biden administration official said, “really highlighted the need to continue to strengthen and consolidate the Multinational Security Support mission” and demonstrates how important the struggling mission is.

“I think that what you’ve seen over the past few weeks, notwithstanding some of the very concerning and tragic incidents, is the fact that there’s still extremely strong support from the United States to restore stability in Haiti that the Kenyan leaders of the Multinational Security Support mission have very strong political will to remain engaged, and we’re seeing more countries come on board, willing to support the mission,” the U.S. official said.

During the meeting, the delegation reiterated the United States’ support for reshaping the MSS mission into a United Nations peacekeeping operation. After planning to push the move during a recent U.N. Security Council meeting, the U.S. backed down but emphasized that it remains committed to the transformation.

“In all, it was a really good day. There were very serious, substantive discussions between the U.S. delegation and a range of Haitian partners that we saw,” the official said. “While there’s still important challenges, there’s also progress being made in terms of the institution of the transitional Presidential Council and in the building up of the Kenyan-led multinational Security Support mission.”

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