‘A good day…for democracy’: Biden, staving off big midterm losses, has ‘wind at his back’ as he heads abroad
“The American people are sending [President Biden] out onto the world stage in a very strong position,” national security advisor Jake Sullivan said.
President Joe Biden, expressing growing optimism at signs that American democracy is recovering from his predecessor’s efforts to prevent the peaceful transfer of power last year, heads abroad tonight for a week of international meetings with the ‘wind at his back’ after his Democratic party staved off big losses in the US midterm elections this week, a top advisor said.
“When it comes to the president leaving after the results on Tuesday and the incoming results that continue to flow in, he feels very good about where things stand, and he feels like he is going out on this trip with the wind very much at his back,” Biden national security advisor Jake Sullivan told journalists at the White House today (Nov. 10). “And that gives him an excellent opportunity both to deal with competitors from a strong position and to rally allies.”
Sullivan said the still emerging results—control of the House seemed likely to tip to the Republicans, however narrowly, while control of the Senate is not yet clear—would let Biden project continuity on his foreign policy initiatives, from strongly supporting Ukraine to managing competition with China.
Biden leaves late tonight (Nov. 10) for a trip that will take him to Egypt for the COP27 climate conference; to Cambodia for the US-ASEAN summit; and then to Bali, Indonesia for the G20, and his first in-person meeting as president with Chinese President Xi Jinping, on Nov. 14.
“As far as the continuing support of the United States for critical foreign policy initiatives, the President was clear yesterday, and he will be very clear on the trip, that there will be strong, enduring, unflagging, unwavering support for Ukraine in the face of Russia's aggression,” Sullivan said. “There is a bipartisan basis and foundation to our approach to China. And he looks forward to working with both parties on that issue, whatever the final composition of the two houses of Congress.”
‘A Good Day…for Democracy’
Biden himself expressed renewed optimism about the signs of the recovering health of American democracy, amid continuing deep concerns about domestic extremism, election denialism, and political violence witnessed in the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection at the US Capitol (and more recently in the politically motivated assault on the spouse of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi at their San Francisco area home last month.)
“It was the first national election since January 6, and there were a lot of concerns about whether democracy would meet the test,” an exuberant Biden, joined by Vice President Kamala Harris, told campaign volunteers and poll workers at a political event Howard Theater in Washington, D.C. today. “It did. It did. It did.”
‘It’s a good day, I think, for democracy,” Biden told reporters at a news conference Wednesday (November 9), a day after the midterm polls. “And I think it was a good day for America.”
“Our democracy has been tested in recent years,” Biden said. “But with their votes, the American people have spoken and proven once again that democracy is who we are.”
Biden marveled at the people who run elections across the country resisting widespread fears of pressure and threats and the voters turning out in spite of the same concerns.
“The states across the country saw record voter turnout,” he said. “And the heart and soul of our democracy -- the voters, the poll workers, the election officials -- they did their job and they fulfilled their duty, and apparently without much interference at all,” he said. “And that’s a testament, I think, to the American people.”
Initial results from the midterms Tuesday—including the losses in Pennsylvania of Trump-backed Senate Republican candidate Dr. Mehmet Oz and extremist Republican gubernatorial candidate Doug Mastriano, who traveled to Trump’s Jan. 6 rally to try to prevent Congress certifying Biden’s election—suggest that Trump’s grip on the Republican party may be starting to wane.
“I don't think we're going to break the fever for the super mega MAGA Republicans,” Biden said Wednesday. “But I think they're a minority of the Republican Party. I think the vast majority of the members of the Republican Party, we disagree strongly on issues, but they're decent, honorable people.”
Biden recounted attending a G7 meeting shortly after his inauguration last year, and the fears he heard from other world leaders about the stability of American democracy in the wake of the Jan. 6 insurrection.
“And so, what I find is that they want to know: Is the United States stable?” Biden said. “Are we the same democracy we've always been?…They're very concerned that we are still the open democracy we've been and that we have rules and the institutions matter.”
A reporter asked him, “So how do you reassure them, if that is the reason for their questioning, that the former President will not return or that his political movement.. will not once again take power in the United States?”
“Well, we just have to demonstrate that he will not take power…if he does run,” Biden said. “I'm making sure he, under legitimate efforts of our Constitution, does not become the next President again.”
As to working with a possibly Republican controlled House or Congress, Biden said he was open to working across the aisle, as he has throughout his career.
“In the area of foreign policy, I hope we'll continue this bipartisan approach of confronting Russia's aggression in Ukraine,” Biden said. “When I return from the G20 meetings in Indonesia with other world leaders, I'm going to invite the leaders of both political parties, as I've done in the past on my foreign trips, to the White House to discuss how we can work together for the remainder of this year and into the next Congress to advance the economic and national security priorities of the United States.”
As to the flurry of investigations some House Republicans plan to launch against him, Biden said he believes the American people are looking for something else, but there is not much he can do about it.
“Look, I think the American public want us to move on and get things done for them,” Biden said. “I think the American people will look at all of that for what it is….But…I can't control what they're going to do. All I can do is continue to try to make life better for the American people.”
As to earlier reported comments by House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy suggesting under a Republican-controlled House, “there would be no blank check for Ukraine,” Biden expressed the hope that he and McCarthy could try to find a modus vivendi.
“This is my expectation,” Biden responded to a question if US aid to Ukraine will continue uninterrupted. “And, by the way, we’ve not given Ukraine a blank check,” he said, noting, for instance, the US declined Ukraine’s initial requests for a US or NATO-instituted no-fly-zone, so as to avoid direct US/Russian conflict.
“So, I would be surprised if Leader McCarthy even has a majority of his Republican colleagues who say they're not going to fund the legitimate defensive needs of Ukraine,” he said.
Bipartisan consensus to ‘support Ukraine/weaken Russia’
Olya Oliker, director of the Europe and Central Asia program at the International Crisis Group, agreed that bipartisan consensus to continue supporting Ukraine from Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war of aggression would likely continue even in a GOP-led Congress.
“So, look, if there's anything on which there's bipartisan consensus, it is ‘support Ukraine, weaken Russia,’” Oliker said at a Crisis Group meeting on the implications of the mid-terms on US foreign policy Wednesday. “I think, in general, there certainly are a few folks in the Republican Party that would prefer to do a little less supporting of Ukraine. But…to the extent there's a mainstream in the Republican Party, that's not where it's at.”
“I think it is reasonable to expect more oversight and more efforts to get more clarity on what exactly the Biden administration is doing,” Oliker said. But the weapons will keep flowing to Ukraine, she assessed.
“One of the things I've noticed is, every time…in both Europe and the United States that Ukraine fatigue sets in, the Russians do something obnoxious and support for Ukraine because reinvigorated,” Oliker added.
Former NSC Russia expert Fiona Hill said she wondered, with Russia’s announced decision to withdraw from the Ukrainian city of Kherson, if Putin was possibly considering announcing a unilateral ceasefire and calling for negotiations.
“What I suspect [Putin] might try to do is…pull back from Kherson…and declare a unilateral ceasefire, …and then call for negotiations,” Hill said at a forum hosted by the Salzburg Global Seminar at the US Institute of Peace on Wednesday night. “That would immediately put Ukraine on the back foot,” she said, as there would be “a heck of a lot of relief in all kinds of quarters” in the United States and in Europe as well that Russia supposedly wanted to negotiate, she said.
“He could very easily do something like that, that…could turn all of these things around, because he picks up on public opinion that he is losing this right now,” Hill said.
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