Carter viewed the Panama Canal transfer as a defining moment of his presidency, while Donald Trump recently reignited debate, calling it a "giveaway."

There were many reasons that Ronald Reagan defeated Jimmy Carter in 1980. The Panama Canal Treaty wasn’t among them.

In recent weeks, when he was President-elect Donald Trump publicly said that Panama should return the Panama Canal to the United States, and he would not rule out using military force to reclaim it. At his presidential Inauguration on Monday Trump doubled down on saying that his new administration was going to take back the canal.