President Donald Trump announced Sunday that Tom Barrack, the U.S. Ambassador to Turkey, will take on expanded duties as Special Presidential Envoy to both Syria and Iraq, placing a single diplomat at the center of three overlapping pressure points in the Middle East.
“I am pleased to announce that United States Ambassador to Turkiye, Tom Barrack, who has done an outstanding job, will be named Special Presidential Envoy to Syria and, likewise, Special Presidential Envoy to Iraq, as we advance our strategic cooperation with the Governments of Syria and Iraq,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post Sunday. “Our relationship with them continues to grow.”
Barrack will keep his post in Ankara. “Tom will remain Ambassador to Turkiye, and operate with the full backing of the United States Department of State,” Trump wrote.
The announcement expands a role Barrack had already been playing behind the scenes. Secretary of State Marco Rubio noted Friday that Barrack’s “special envoy title” for Syria had formally expired, but said he would continue as Washington’s lead on both Syria and Iraq. Trump’s Sunday post formalized that arrangement and added Iraq explicitly to Barrack’s portfolio.
The expanded assignment arrives at a volatile moment for U.S. diplomacy in the region. Washington remains in active nuclear talks with Iran, and Trump told Fox News recently that he was “in no hurry” to finalize a deal with Tehran, while warning that military action remains an option. War Secretary Pete Hegseth said U.S. forces remain positioned to resume strikes against Iran if negotiations collapse.
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps struck Kurdish separatist groups in northern Iraq over the weekend, according to Reuters, a signal that conflict can still spread across borders even as diplomacy continues.
Syria, long a proxy battleground for Iranian-backed militant groups, has shifted toward accommodation with the Trump administration and Israel over the past two years. Turkey has played a central role in that realignment, acting as a broker between Washington and Damascus.
Barrack’s triple role as ambassador to Turkey and special envoy to both Syria and Iraq gives him unusual reach over a stretch of territory running from the Turkish border south through the Syrian and Iraqi heartland to the Iranian frontier.
The Strait of Hormuz remains a core sticking point in the Iran nuclear talks. Trump has said any deal must guarantee that Tehran will not close the strait. Roughly 20 percent of globally traded oil passes through it.
