The film portrays the controversial presence of thousands of young Americans in the Brazilian Northeast in the 1960s, with the Peace Corps volunteer program. Through testimonies, long archival material and historical documentation, "In the name of America" approaches the contradictions between the American foreign policy, established by John F. Kennedy, and the motivations of the volunteers, who found themselves astonished, in a region marked by hunger and violence. The 1964 military coup in Brazil, the Vietnam War, the infiltration of the CIA in Latin America round out the scenario and reveal the fears of elites and governments that the Brazilian Northeast became a "new Cuba."