Chattanooga Times Free Press

Biden eyes major foreign policy shifts if he wins

- BY MATTHEW LE AND WILL WEISSERT

WASHINGTON — Should former Vice President Joe Biden win the White House in November, America will likely be in for a foreign policy aboutface as Biden reverses, dismantles or severely curtails many of President Donald Trump’s most significan­t and boldest actions.

From the Middle East to Asia, Latin America to Africa and, particular­ly, Europe, and on issues including trade, terrorism, arms control and immigratio­n, the presumptiv­e Democratic nominee and his advisers have vowed to unleash a tsunami of change in how the U.S. handles itself in the internatio­nal arena.

With few exceptions, Americans could expect Biden to re-engage with traditiona­l allies. Where the iconoclast­ic Trump has used blunt threats and insults to press his case, Biden, a former senator, would be more inclined to seek common ground.

Historical­ly, U.S. foreign policy hasn’t changed drasticall­y as the presidency shifted between Democratic and Republican administra­tions. Allies and adversarie­s stayed the same and a non-partisan diplomatic corps pursued American interests.

That changed with Trump. Under his “America First” policy, he viewed both allies and the foreign policy establishm­ent with suspicion, while speaking warmly of adversarie­s like North Korea’s Kim Jong Un and Russia’s Vladimir Putin.

But Trump found it hard to make swift changes. Academics often say that American foreign policy is like an aircraft carrier: easy to order a wholesale change of direction from the bridge but far more difficult and time-consuming to alter course.

Trump saw that when he was unable to extricate the U.S. from the Iran nuclear deal for more than year. His well-publicized withdrawal­s from the Paris Climate Accord and the World Health Organizati­on won’t actually become final until after the Nov. 3 election, if ever. His decision to redeploy thousands of troops from Germany could take years.

Trump’s initial problems may have reflected a lack of government­al experience by both him and his top advisers. That created a steep learning curve that was complicate­d by their intense distrust of national security institutio­ns.

Biden, with his Senate and White House experience, may be better positioned to deliver on change swiftly.

Biden told reporters Tuesday in Delaware that he knows “how to get things done internatio­nally.”

“I understand the national security and intelligen­ce issues,” he said. “That’s what I’ve done my whole life. Trump has no notion of it. None.”

Biden’s campaign also has assembled an experience­d team of foreign policy advisers: Jake Sullivan served as deputy assistant to President Barack Obama and policy planning director at the State Department. Nicholas Burns had high-level foreign policy positions under Presidents George W. Bush and Bill

Clinton. Tony Blinken was deputy secretary of state and deputy national security adviser to Obama.

Susan Rice, national security adviser and U.N. ambassador under Obama, is a finalist for vice president. If she isn’t selected, she could become a key adviser if Biden wins.

The Trump campaign casts Biden’s foreign policy experience as a weakness.

“Joe Biden’s record of appeasemen­t and globalism would be detrimenta­l for American foreign policy and national security, and after decades of the status quo, President Trump has made it clear that the United States will no longer be taken advantage of by the rest of the world,” deputy press secretary Ken Farnaso said in a statement.

For decades, the first and often only foreign policy shift that new presidents of both parties directed on their first day in office, and Trump was no exception, was abortion-related.

Like clockwork, Republican­s enacted the so-called “Mexico City” language -known by opponents as the “global gag rule” -- to prohibit the use of U.S. foreign assistance for abortion-related services. Democrats rescinded it and should Biden win, he has promised to follow suit.

But he’s also pledged to demolish other Trump policies on Day One. They include reversing Trump’s ban on immigratio­n from mainly Muslim countries, restoring U.S. funding and membership to the WHO and halting efforts to oppose the Paris Climate Accord. He’s promised to call top NATO leaders and declare of U.S. foreign policy, “We’re back” while convening a summit of major heads of state in his first year.

Newspapers in English

Newspapers from United States