Washington cannot credibly court Central Asia as an economic partner while keeping Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan tethered to a Soviet-era trade law.

Rep. Jason Smith’s official visit to Central Asia deserves more attention in Washington than the usual congressional delegation trip. As chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, Smith occupies one of the few positions in Congress from which he can dismantle a trade policy that has outlived the geopolitical world that produced it.

Smith is the first Ways and Means chairman to visit Central Asia. That distinction matters because his committee oversees international trade, including bilateral trade relations and commerce with non-market economies. It also matters because Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan remain subject to a Cold War-era law that Washington has never fully retired.

Congress enacted the Jackson-Vanik Amendment in 1974 to pressure the Soviet Union and other communist countries that restricted emigration, particularly that of Soviet Jews. More than three decades after the Soviet Union collapsed, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan are still covered by its provisions, although presidential waivers allow them to receive normal trade relations.

The arrangement functions in practice, but its continued existence is increasingly difficult to defend. Two countries Washington now treats as important economic and strategic partners are still operating under a legal framework built for a hostile superpower in a vastly different era.

Both governments have explicitly raised the issue with Washington. In 2024, U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai welcomed Kazakhstan’s interest in ending the application of Jackson-Vanik and said the United States was committed to expanding bilateral trade. During a visit to Uzbekistan that same year, Tai similarly welcomed Tashkent’s interest in the law’s “expeditious termination.”

Congress now has an opportunity to act. Lawmakers have introduced legislation to normalize trade relations with Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. The U.S.-Kazakhstan Trade Modernization Act, for example, would end the application of Title IV of the Trade Act of 1974 to Kazakh products and authorize permanent normal trade relations.

Smith’s trip comes at a particularly useful moment. The 2026 midterm elections will be held on Nov. 3, and the current Congress will adjourn in January 2027. If the legislation fails to advance, its supporters may have to begin again in a new Congress, under different political priorities and potentially different committee leadership. The coming months therefore offer a genuine, if narrow, legislative window.

The broader direction of U.S. policy already points toward normalization. Washington’s interest in Central Asia has grown considerably. In November 2025, President Donald Trump hosted the five Central Asian presidents at the White House for a C5+1 summit marking the 10th anniversary of the regional diplomatic format. The meeting produced a significant economic push, including more than $25 billion in announced commercial agreements involving the United States and the five Central Asian states.

The importance of that engagement extends beyond the headline figure. Washington increasingly views Central Asia through the lens of critical minerals, resilient supply chains, energy security, and regional connectivity. Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan are becoming more important to that strategy, not less.

Jackson-Vanik, however, sends the opposite message. Washington is asking Central Asian governments to integrate more deeply into American supply chains and expand commercial ties while retaining a trade mechanism designed to punish Soviet-era restrictions. The mismatch is more than an anachronism. It makes U.S. policy look divided against itself.

The Trump administration has an opportunity to bring those competing signals into alignment. Trump has invited the presidents of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan to the 2026 G20 summit in Miami. Neither country belongs to the G20, making the invitations a deliberate gesture by the American host. Trump has described U.S. relations with both governments as “spectacular” and emphasized the potential for greater trade and cooperation.

The sequence is telling: a presidential C5+1 summit in Washington, expanding commercial engagement, a congressional delegation led by the chairman of the House’s chief trade committee, and G20 invitations for two Central Asian presidents.

None of this proves that the White House and Congress are coordinating specifically on Jackson-Vanik. Congress is institutionally independent, and legislative action cannot be taken for granted. But the convergence creates an obvious political opening.

Trump could arrive at the Miami summit with more than ceremonial invitations for the leaders of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. He could show that Washington’s renewed interest in Central Asia produces concrete results. Ending Jackson-Vanik’s application—or at least moving the legislation decisively forward before the current Congress expires—would cost the United States little while carrying considerable symbolic weight.

It would tell Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan that Washington sees them not as vestiges of the Soviet past but as partners in America’s economic future. For Trump, it would be a useful diplomatic deliverable for two strategically important leaders.

For Congress, it would remove a legal relic that no longer serves its original purpose. And for U.S. businesses, it would signal that Washington intends to build an enduring economic relationship with Central Asia rather than merely announce one.

The real measure of Smith’s trip, then, will come after he returns to Washington. If the Ways and Means chairman concludes that Jackson-Vanik is out of step with U.S. interests in Central Asia, he has the institutional power to turn a long-standing diplomatic request into a legislative priority.

The United States has already moved beyond the Cold War in its strategy toward Central Asia. Congress should finally do the same with its trade laws.