Розділ: Політика
Detroit-Area County Certifies Vote After First Blocking It
Michigan’s largest county reversed course and unanimously certified its presidential election results Tuesday night after Republicans first blocked the move in a party-line vote that threatened to temporarily stall official approval of Democrat Joe Biden’s win in the state.The Wayne County Board of Canvassers acted after the 2-2 tie was condemned by Democrats and election experts as a dangerous attempt to overthrow the will of voters.The board met after days of unsuccessful litigation filed by Republican poll challengers and President Donald Trump’s allies. They claimed fraud during absentee ballot counting at a Detroit convention center, but two judges found no evidence and refused to stop the canvassing process.Biden crushed Trump in Wayne County, a Democratic stronghold, by more than a 2-1 margin and won the state by 146,000 votes, according to unofficial results.The canvassers first rejected certification of the Detroit-area vote with a tie. Monica Palmer, a Republican on the board, said poll books in certain Detroit precincts were out of balance. In response, Jonathan Kinloch, a Democrat, said it was “reckless and irresponsible” to not certify the results.”It’s not based upon fraud. It’s absolutely human error,” Kinloch said of any discrepancies. “Votes that are cast are tabulated.”The board then listened to a parade of spectators blasting Palmer and fellow Republican William Hartmann during the meeting’s public comment period over Zoom.The Rev. Wendell Anthony, a well-known pastor and head of the Detroit branch of the NAACP, called the Republican county canvassers a “disgrace.””You have extracted a Black city out of a county and said the only ones that are at fault is the city of Detroit, where 80% of the people who reside here are African Americans. Shame on you!” Anthony said on Zoom, his voice rising during a public comment period.Certification of the Nov. 3 election results in each of Michigan’s 83 counties is a step toward statewide certification by the Michigan Board of State Canvassers.
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By Polityk | 11/18/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Post-Election, US Senators and Social Media CEOs Agree Change is Needed
Facing charges of censorship, the CEOs of Twitter and Facebook appeared before a hearing of U.S. lawmakers Tuesday to defend actions taken during the recent U.S. elections. Tina Trinh reports.Produced by: Matt Dibble
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By Polityk | 11/18/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Trump Fires Cybersecurity Official
President Donald Trump announced Tuesday on Twitter that he had fired Chris Krebs, director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, for a recent statement Krebs made regarding election security. Krebs has consistently debunked allegations of voter fraud over the past week, tweeting, “On allegations that election systems were manipulated, 59 election security experts all agree, ‘in every case of which we are aware, these claims either have been unsubstantiated or are technically incoherent.’ ” On Tuesday, Trump tweeted that Krebs’s statements were “highly inaccurate,” alleging “massive improprieties and fraud.” Trump’s tweet was labeled as “disputed” by Twitter. “Therefore, effective immediately, Chris Krebs has been terminated as Director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency,” he tweeted. The recent statement by Chris Krebs on the security of the 2020 Election was highly inaccurate, in that there were massive improprieties and fraud – including dead people voting, Poll Watchers not allowed into polling locations, “glitches” in the voting machines which changed…— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 18, 2020
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By Polityk | 11/18/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Controversial Fed Nominee Shelton Stalls in Senate Test Vote
The nomination of Judy Shelton, President Donald Trump’s controversial pick for the Federal Reserve, is stalled in the Senate after Vice President-elect Kamala Harris returned to the chamber to cast a key vote in a tally Tuesday. Two key Republicans were absent because of COVID-related concerns. The 47-50 vote came as the Republican-controlled Senate continues to focus its energies in the post-election lame-duck session on confirming Trump’s appointees. Shelton is an unusually caustic critic of the Fed and was opposed by two GOP senators, Susan Collins of Maine and Mitt Romney of Utah, in Tuesday’s vote. Harris has been focused on the transition to the Biden administration but returned to the chamber for her first vote since winning the vice presidency. Vice President-elect Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., walks from the Senate chamber after voting against President Donald Trump’s choice for the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, Judy Shelton, at the Capitol in Washington, November 17, 2020.Senator-elect Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., is likely to join the Senate when the chamber returns from its Thanksgiving break. That could leave Shelton short of support for confirmation even if Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., seeks a revote next month.Another Republican opponent, Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, missed Tuesday’s vote, and his return could cement Shelton’s fate, even after Rick Scott, R-Fla., and Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, return to the chamber after quarantining because of exposure to the coronavirus. FILE – Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Mark Kelly speaks at an election watch party in Tucson, Arizona, November 3, 2020.McConnell initially voted “aye” but changed his vote to reserve the option to call a second tally if he can line up the votes. Another potential supporter, Bill Cassidy, R-La., missed Tuesday’s vote. All in all, accounting for absences and the arrival of Kelly, who defeated Martha McSally, R-Ariz., Shelton would appear to be one vote short, assuming there won’t be a revote this week. The Senate is slated to be recessed next week for Thanksgiving. Trump spokesman Judd Deere tweeted Tuesday that the White House remains “confident that Judy Shelton will be confirmed upon reconsideration.” Shelton’s nomination has been sharply partisan for a nominee to the Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors. The Fed seeks to maintain a degree of political independence, though it is often criticized by members of Congress and in recent years by Trump. The vice chair of the Fed’s board, Richard Clarida, was approved by a vote of 69-26 in August 2018. FILE – White House chief economic adviser Larry Kudlow talks to reporters about the economic impact of the coronavirus, at the White House, March 16, 2020, in Washington.White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow is said to be a strong supporter of Shelton. The Trump White House has at times struggled to get its nominees on the Fed board. Its previous two picks, economics commentator Stephen Moore and the late Herman Cain, a former GOP presidential candidate, both withdrew without a Senate vote in the face of strong opposition. Shelton, also a conservative economics commentator, is opposed by Senate Democrats, most economists and many former Fed officials for her past support of the gold standard and for writings that questioned the Fed’s political independence. Under the gold standard, the U.S. dollar’s value is tied to gold. Under that approach, the Fed would have less leeway to adjust interest rates, even in a severe recession. “I think her views are too extreme,” Richard Fisher, former president of the Dallas Federal Reserve, said Tuesday on CNBC after the Senate vote. “I just don’t think it would send the right signal to have her as governor at this time.” Shelton was approved by the Senate Banking Committee on a 13-12 party-line vote in July. Senate Democrats criticized her for appearing to flip-flop on many positions, including near-zero interest rates. She opposed ultra-low rates during President Barack Obama’s presidency but supported them after Trump took office and demanded that the Fed lower its short-term benchmark rate. “Shelton has shown herself to be an economic weathervane, pointing whichever direction she believes the partisan winds are blowing,” said Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. As a member of the Fed’s powerful board of governors, Shelton would vote on the Fed’s rate decisions and on banking regulation. The governors also vote on whether to institute emergency measures, such as the Fed’s decisions in March to start buying corporate bonds for the first time and institute a raft of programs to bolster financial markets. Still, on her own, it’s unlikely that Shelton would have much effect on Fed policy, economists have pointed out. The central bank operates by consensus, and Fed governors rarely dissent from interest-rate decisions, though Fed bank presidents do. For now, the Fed has pegged its benchmark rate to nearly zero, and Fed officials have said they expect it to remain there until at least 2023. Shelton has been picked to fill a term that expires in 2024.
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By Polityk | 11/18/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Biden Warns of Lethal Consequences if Trump Won’t Coordinate on Coronavirus Response
President-elect Joe Biden warned that outgoing President Donald Trump’s refusal to recognize the transition prior to the January 20 inauguration could have dire consequences amid the coronavirus pandemic. “More people may die if we don’t coordinate,” Biden said in response to a reporter’s question Monday in Wilmington, Delaware.Biden, again warning of a “very dark winter” ahead, called for immediate congressional passage of the HEROES Act — a proposed $3 trillion stimulus package in response to the economic devastation wrought by COVID-19. “The idea the president is still playing golf and not doing anything about it is beyond my comprehension,” Biden said, adding, “At least you’d think he’d want to go off on a positive note.” The president-elect said people are running out of unemployment insurance, 20 million people are on the verge of losing their homes because they cannot make mortgage payments, and “you have a larger number being kicked out and that will be kicked out on the street because they can’t pay their rent.”
Biden made the remarks following a briefing he and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris held on the state of the U.S. economy, which faces new headwinds with the surge in coronavirus cases. The spike in cases and hospitalizations has prompted some state governors and municipal officials to reimpose limits on business operations to try to curb the spread of COVID-19. President-elect Joe Biden listens as Vice President-elect Kamala Harris speaks about economic recovery at The Queen theater, in Wilmington, Delaware, Nov. 16, 2020.”To state the obvious, we are currently in a pretty dark hole right now, at least in regards to where we’re headed with COVID,” Biden said during a discussion with business and labor leaders. Trump, who remained in the White House on Monday and made no public appearances, had the stock market on his mind in the morning, touting an announcement about a second coronavirus vaccine for causing a rise in share prices as the trading week began.The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed up 470 points on Monday, a rise of 1.6%. “Please remember that these great discoveries, which will end the China Plague, all took place on my watch!” the president said on Twitter, referring to the efficacies of COVID-19 vaccines announced by Pfizer a week ago and Moderna on Monday. “They appear to be ready for prime time — ready to be used,” Biden said of the vaccines. He has criticized Trump for making statements that he said might make people hesitant to get inoculated. Mass vaccinations across America may still be months away, while the number of coronavirus cases and hospitalizations are increasing to record numbers. A researcher works in a lab run by Moderna Inc, in an undated still image from video.The United States has now recorded more than 246,000 coronavirus deaths and 11.1 million infections, according to Johns Hopkins University. Both figures are the highest of any country. The U.S. economy has recovered millions of the jobs lost in the first weeks of the pandemic in March and April when the unemployment rate hit 14.7%. The jobless rate improved to 6.9% in October, still nearly double the five-decade low figure of 3.5% recorded before the virus swept into the United States from China and Europe. Still, millions of jobs disappeared in the pandemic and may not be recovered, as new coronavirus infections surge throughout the country. Election resultsBiden’s ability to shape the economic recovery is to a large degree contingent on the outcome of two runoff elections in the southern state of Georgia on January 5. Republicans have already won 50 of the 100 seats in the Senate that takes office in early January. Democrats have 48. If incumbent Republicans win either or both of the Georgia elections, Republicans will continue to control the Senate for the next two years and limit the new president’s options to advance his legislative agenda, including economic assistance to financially hard-pressed families. If Democrats win the two elections in Georgia, Biden could gain leverage in a politically divided Senate, with Harris, as vice president, breaking tie votes in favor of his initiatives. Trump has refused to concede his defeat while he pursues legal claims that the November 3 vote was rigged against him. He also cites what he calls irregularities in several states. State election officials have reported no serious irregularities with the vote that would impact the outcome of the race. “I won,” Trump tweeted on Monday. “No, Biden won the election,” The Associated Press stated in a fact-check story issued following the president’s declaration on Twitter, noting the former vice president achieved victory in key states, topping the 270-electoral-vote threshold, with room to spare, to clinch the presidency. A coalition of state election officials and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security declared in a joint statement that the election was the most secure in history and there is “no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes or was in any way compromised.”
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By Polityk | 11/17/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Trump Campaign Abandons Parts of Pennsylvania Election Lawsuit
U.S. President Donald Trump’s campaign on Sunday dropped a major part of a lawsuit it brought seeking to halt Pennsylvania from certifying its results in the presidential election, narrowing the case to a small number of ballots. In an amended complaint filed in federal court, the Trump campaign dropped a claim that election officials unlawfully blocked observers from watching the counting of mail-in ballots in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. The pared-down lawsuit now focuses on a claim that Democratic-leaning counties unlawfully allowed voters to fix errors in their mail-in ballots in violation of state law. Officials have said the dispute affects a small number of ballots in the state, where Democrat Joe Biden is projected to win by more than 60,000 votes. Pennsylvania officials had asked a judge to toss Trump’s lawsuit, saying the election observers were allowed to assess the processing of mail-in ballots and that all the state’s counties were permitted to inform residents if their mailed-in ballots were deficient, even if it was not mandatory for them to do so. In Pennsylvania’s populous Montgomery County, fewer than 100 voters fixed ballots with technical errors, a county official testified at a court hearing on Nov. 4. The Trump campaign continues to seek a court order blocking the Pennsylvania secretary of state from ratifying the result. Biden clinched the election after news media and Edison Research called him as the winner in Pennsylvania, putting him over the 270 electoral votes needed to win. Trump on Sunday briefly appeared to acknowledge that Biden’s victory, but then recanted and claimed he would soon file fresh challenges. His campaign has filed a string of long-shot lawsuits in several battleground states. On Twitter on Sunday, Trump said many cases being filed were not from his campaign. Legal experts say the lawsuits have little chance of changing the outcome of the election. A senior Biden legal adviser has dismissed the litigation as “theatrics, not really lawsuits.” Pennsylvania is scheduled to certify its election results on Nov. 23.
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By Polityk | 11/16/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Predictability Points to Stability for US Economy, Markets in Biden Era, Analysts Say
Joe Biden, the projected winner of the U.S. presidential election, will inherit a pandemic-ravaged economy that shows signs of recovery. As Keith Kocinski reports, Biden’s ambitious economic agenda would face hurdles in a politically divided Congress.
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By Polityk | 11/15/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Political Polling Once Again Under Microscope
Frank Luntz is a noted Republican political pollster. In the days before the Nov. 3 election, he said if the 2020 pre-election polls were wrong again, “my profession is done.”In the days after the election, Luntz said the results are “devastating for my industry.”“The polls were really bad this time and really misleading, and I’m not sure why,” said Elaine Kamarck, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.In 2016, the pre-election polls of individual states were off quite a bit, showing Democrat Hillary Clinton ahead of Republican Donald Trump in key states that Trump eventually won. Pollsters failed to adequately account for education levels and underestimated Trump’s support among whites without a college education.Undercounting Trump’s supportPollsters acknowledged the shortcomings and said they adjusted how they weigh education levels for the 2020 election. But there appears to have been a similar undercount of Trump supporters during the run-up to the latest election.“We are missing some small set of Trump supporters, who are not necessarily Republicans, but who are declining to take part in the survey systematically,” said Charles Franklin, director of the Marquette Law School Poll in Wisconsin.In 2016, the Marquette Poll had Clinton up 6 percentage points in Wisconsin. Trump won by 1 percentage point. “This time we have the right winner, and we’re off by 3 or 4 depending on turnout,” Franklin explained.Biden won Wisconsin by 20,000 votes, a 0.63 percentage point lead over Trump. The Marquette Poll showed Biden 5 percentage points up on Trump a week before the election.Key states that were off the pre-election polling averages by 5 or more percentage points were Wisconsin (7 percentage points), Iowa (7), Florida (6), Michigan (5), Ohio (5) and Texas (5). Trump won four of those states – all but Michigan.Unrealistic expectations?Nate Silver, editor in chief of FiveThirtyEight, a website that analyzes polling data, pushes back on the notion that the polls were wrong, writing that polls accurately called 48 of the 50 states along with the winner of the Electoral College and popular vote, Joe Biden.There is an underlying possibility of error in any poll. Most of the polls used in the presidential polling averages allowed for a polling error of 3 to 4 percentage points either way. Silver says polling’s 3 to 4 percentage point underestimate of Trump’s vote is within historical standards, and the public has to adjust expectations that “demand(ed) an unrealistic level of precision” of polling.“The polls set expectations too high for Democrats,” said Bill Schneider, professor at the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University. Schneider, a longtime political analyst for CNN, said Democrats “ended up doing worse than expected.”Many experts point to declining response rates to telephone polling as a problem in getting it right. They are also finding that Democrats are likelier to respond to polling inquiries than Republicans.For campaigns that depend on polling to make decisions about resource allocation, “they have to go back to an old-fashioned way before we had polling,” said Kamarck, who is also a member of the Democratic National Committee. She said having people on the ground to canvass “precinct by precinct, county by county, state by state” may be the way voter research is conducted in the future.“The state-by-state polls that they did this time in order to make up for the problems they had four years ago really have been wildly off,” Kamarck said.And regarding Frank Luntz’s prediction about his profession if there was a repeat of 2016? “Frankie may be out of business,” Kamarck remarked.
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By Polityk | 11/15/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
New US Diplomat: South Sudan Policy Unlikely to Change
U.S. government policy toward South Sudan isn’t expected to change regardless of the new presidential administration, according to Jon Danilowicz, the new U.S. charge d’affaires to South Sudan.He said the top priority will remain restoring peace and stability in the country. U.S. President-elect Joe Biden has been declared the winner, but President Donald Trump has so far refused to concede. Some mail ballots are still being counted.This week at his first news conference at the U.S. Embassy since arriving in Juba nearly two months ago, Danilowicz said there has been bipartisan consensus between Democrats and Republicans on U.S. policy toward South Sudan.“If I look at the current U.S. policy and engagement on South Sudan and if I look at the future, I don’t see significant differences regarding how the United States will engage in South Sudan depending on which political party may be in power in the executive branch or legislature,” Danilowicz told reporters.Danilowicz said Washington’s main objective in South Sudan is to ensure its political leaders restore stability across the country and to promote democracy which ensures delivery of services to vulnerable South Sudanese people.“A priority for my government both bilaterally and as partners of the Troika … our colleagues from the United Kingdom and Norway — is to do all what we can to support the peace process,” said Danilowicz.After months of haggling, mediators for South Sudan President Salva Kiir’s ruling Sudan People’s Liberation Party and opposition parties signed a revitalized peace agreement in 2018 and formed a transitional government the following year.Danilowicz said the U.S. government is discussing plans to construct a new embassy compound in Juba, which he said is symbolic of Washington’s long-term commitment to South Sudan.In 2014 the United States scaled back funding to South Sudan after the country’s civil war erupted in late 2013.Washington reduced funding for development projects and shifted much of its financial assistance to humanitarian aid. The U.S. also imposed targeted sanctions on senior South Sudanese politicians and military commanders accused of spoiling peace efforts in the country.Asked whether the U.S. would continue to sanction South Sudanese individuals accused of obstructing peace efforts, Danilowicz explained that sanctions are a tool “that not just the United States but other bilateral countries use” in their relationships with South Sudan and other countries.He said while the U.S. considers steering part of its funding to community resilience projects, such as job creation programs and sustainable development projects, much of the funding will continue to go toward humanitarian assistance.The U.S. diplomat noted the United States is still concerned about the slow pace of implementing two key provisions of the revitalized peace deal: security arrangements and power sharing.“We look forward to engaging conversation recognizing that these chapters of the peace agreement are absolutely essential if we are to see the rest of the processes move forward and if we are to see improvement in the security situation, which will enable further development in economic growth,” said Danilowicz.It’s been two years since South Sudan’s former warring parties signed the peace agreement, but government and rebel forces have yet to form one unified army, a core provision of the peace deal, and many state and local governments have yet to be set up.
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By Polityk | 11/14/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Doug Emhoff Makes History as First ‘Second Gentleman’
Kamala Harris made history as the first woman projected to become vice president-elect. That means her husband, Doug Emhoff, is set to become America’s first-ever “second gentleman” in the White House. VOA’s Mariama Diallo has more.
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By Polityk | 11/14/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Trump Renews ‘Rigged Election’ Claim Against All Evidence
President Donald Trump persisted Friday in claiming the U.S. presidential election was rigged despite assurances from federal and state officials, and private industry partners, that the November 3 vote was the “most secure” in the nation’s history.Heartwarming to see all of the tremendous support out there, especially the organic Rallies that are springing up all over the Country, including a big one on Saturday in D.C. I may even try to stop by and say hello. This Election was Rigged, from Dominion all the way up & down!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) FILE – U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency Director Christopher Krebs speaks to reporters at CISA’s Election Day Operation Center on Super Tuesday in Arlington, Va., March 3, 2020.The Reuters news agency on Thursday, citing three sources familiar with the matter, reported that CISA Director Christopher Krebs had told associates that he expected the White House to fire him, in part for refusing to remove or change information on the Rumor Control website.Neither CISA nor the White House responded to VOA requests for comment. But word that Krebs could be on the way out sparked an outcry from state election officials, lawmakers and former officials.“Director Krebs and the many other CISA staffers we interact with have been invaluable partners in further securing election infrastructure and sharing vital information,” said Maria Benson, speaking for the National Association of Secretaries of State, in an email to VOA.MORE reaction to the reports that @CISAKrebs will be fired – this from the fomer #2 at @ODNIgov@suemgordon22https://t.co/TxCHrckVvu— Jeff Seldin (@jseldin) November 12, 2020Democrat Mark Warner, the vice chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, was even more direct.“Chris Krebs has done a great job protecting our elections. He is one of the few people in this administration respected by everyone on both sides of the aisle,” Warner posted on Twitter. “There is no possible justification to remove him from office. None.”Krebs himself has been active on social media, pushing back against what CISA has labeled disinformation, urging Americans, “Don’t fall for it.”To be crystal clear on ⬇️, I’m specifically referring to the Hammer and Scorecard nonsense. It’s just that – nonsense. This is not a real thing, don’t fall for it and think 2x before you share. #Protect2020https://t.co/f2FpSbRXKy— Chris Krebs #Protect2020 (@CISAKrebs) November 7, 2020
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By Polityk | 11/14/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Latest US Presidential Race Projections: Trump Wins North Carolina, Biden Wins Arizona
U.S. news outlets on Friday called the Southeastern U.S. state of North Carolina for President Donald Trump, a day after projecting that President-elect Joe Biden would win the Southwestern state of Arizona.The latest calls in the presidential race gave Biden a projected 290 votes in the Electoral College to Trump’s 232 votes.Biden had previously cleared the 270-vote threshold needed to win the White House, paving the way for his inauguration on January 20. Trump has refused to acknowledge defeat in the presidential race and has leveled unproven claims of widespread voter fraud.FILE – Poll workers assist voters on a brisk fall morning at the Efland Ruritan Club polling site in Efland, N.C., Nov. 3, 2020.Edison Research, along with major U.S. news outlets, projected Trump the winner in North Carolina, giving him 15 more electoral votes. North Carolina was one of the last states to report its vote tally because it allowed ballots postmarked by Election Day to be received through November 12. With more than 98% of ballots counted in the state, Trump led by more than 73,000 votes.FILE – Arizona election officials count ballots for the general election inside the Maricopa County Recorder’s Office, Nov. 6, 2020, in Phoenix.On Thursday, major U.S. news outlets projected Biden the winner in the Arizona. With more than 99% of the votes counted in that state, Biden led Trump by about 11,000 votes.The New York Times, CNN, NBC News and The Washington Post were among the news organizations that projected Biden the winner in Arizona, historically a Republican stronghold. Fox News and The Associated Press called Arizona for Biden last week.The only state that has not yet been called by all major media outlets is Georgia, with its 16 electoral votes. The state is conducting a statewide, hand recount of the presidential votes because Biden is leading in that state by only about 14,100 votes.Trump, a Republican, has repeatedly made unfounded claims that he was defeated by widespread election fraud. But a statement released Thursday by the federal Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, established by Trump in 2018, said the November 3 election was the most secure in U.S. history. The agency’s declaration was the most direct rejection to date of Trump’s assertions about the fairness of the election.State election officials also report no serious irregularities, while Trump’s legal challenges have failed in court.While Biden is the projected winner of the presidential election, results are subject to legal challenges and recounts.States are required to meet a December 8 deadline to certify their vote counts and pick electors for the Electoral College, which will officially select the new president on December 14.
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By Polityk | 11/14/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Top CEOs Met to Plan Response to Trump’s Election Denial
Only a few of America’s CEOs have made public statements about President Donald Trump’s refusal to accept his election loss, but in private, many are alarmed and talking about what collective action would be necessary if they see an imminent threat to democracy.
On Nov. 6, more than two dozen CEOs of major U.S. corporations took part in a video conference to discuss what to do if Trump refuses to leave office or takes other steps to stay in power beyond the scheduled Jan. 20 inauguration of former Vice President Joe Biden. On Saturday, Biden was declared the election winner by The Associated Press and other news organizations.
During the conference, which lasted more than an hour, the CEOs agreed that Trump had the right to pursue legal challenges alleging voter fraud.
But if Trump tries to undo the legal process or disrupts a peaceful transition to Biden, the CEOs discussed making public statements and pressuring GOP legislators in their states who may try to redirect Electoral College votes from Biden to Trump, said Yale Management Professor Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, who convened the meeting.
“They’re all fine with him taking an appeal to the court, to a judicial process. They didn’t want to deny him that. But that doesn’t stop the transition,” said Sonnenfeld. “They said if that makes people feel better, it doesn’t hurt anything to let that grind through.”
On Saturday, the day after the video meeting, the Business Roundtable, a group that represents the most powerful companies in America, including Walmart, Apple, Starbucks and General Electric, put out a statement congratulating Biden and his running mate, Kamala Harris. It largely reflected the conversation from Friday’s video meeting, saying the group respects Trump’s right to seek recounts and call for investigations where evidence exists.
“There is no indication that any of these would change the outcome,” the group’s statement said.
The executives who participated in the video conference are from Fortune 500 finance, retail, media and manufacturing companies, Sonnenfeld said. But he wouldn’t identify them because they attended the meeting with the condition that their names be kept confidential. Sonnenfeld frequently speaks with CEOs and sets up meetings for them to discuss pressing issues.
Richard Pildes, a constitutional law professor at New York University who spoke at the video meeting, confirmed Sonnenfeld’s account, as did an executive who attended but didn’t want to be identified because he didn’t want to violate the meeting’s ground rules.
The CEOs agreed that they had seen no evidence of widespread election fraud as Trump has contended. Sonnenfeld invited Yale University historian Timothy Snyder, author of “On Tyranny,” to address the group. After hearing Snyder discuss the history of democracies dying after elections and the possibility of GOP legislators changing the Electoral College outcome, many expressed alarm about the president’s conduct, Sonnenfeld said.
There is no evidence of widespread fraud in the 2020 election. In fact, election officials from both political parties have stated publicly that the election went well and international observers confirmed there were no serious irregularities.
The issues Trump’s campaign and its allies have pointed to are typical in every election: problems with signatures, secrecy envelopes and postal marks on mail-in ballots, as well as the potential for a small number of ballots miscast or lost. With Biden leading Trump by wide margins in key battleground states, none of those issues would affect the outcome of the election.
Trump’s campaign has also launched legal challenges complaining that poll watchers were unable to scrutinize the voting process. Many of those challenges have been tossed out by judges.
Trump has portrayed as illegitimate mailed votes received and counted after Election Day — even though that is explicitly allowed in about 20 states. He has falsely charged that campaign observers were blocked from watching the vote count as Biden overtook him in Pennsylvania.
The CEOs decided to wait for the Nov. 20 certification of votes in Georgia before meeting to decide their next moves. Action could include threats to stop donations to political action committees or even corporate relocations, Sonnenfeld said.
He spoke with six or seven CEOs on Wednesday who said that if there were “seditious riots” at Trump rallies or more mass firings like Trump’s ouster of Defense Secretary Mark Esper and other Pentagon officials, they want to reconvene to talk about acting faster as individuals, Sonnenfeld said.
“They thought it could have a very devastating effect upon on markets, on public trust in the process,” and they would act “to make sure that the Republican elected officials do their jobs and and then be patriots and respect the process,” Sonnenfeld said.
The CEOs weren’t worried about reprisals against their businesses but emphasized acting together. They referred to a Benjamin Franklin quote at the signing of the Declaration of Independence: “Yes, we must, indeed, all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately,” according to Sonnenfeld.
But individual CEOs have been mostly silent on Trump’s conduct. Juleanna Glover, CEO of media strategy firm RidgelyWalsh, said no CEO speaking out at this point could stop Trump’s legal challenges.
“They’re trying to be moral and effective leaders,” Glover said. “It’s a calculation of whether saying anything now can be an effective tool to making a situation better.”
The time may come for CEOs to speak out, but most are assuming that Trump’s legal challenges and threats are just theater and the change in power will take place uneventfully, Glover said.
Still, several CEOs have urged Trump to acknowledge that he’s lost, concede to Biden and end any political uncertainty.
“The votes have been counted, and the president needs to honor the result,” said Ryan Gellert, CEO of the outdoor clothing company Patagonia, which has been outspoken on behalf of progressive causes such as protecting the environment.
Economist Eswar Prasad of Cornell University, a former International Monetary Fund official, said Trump’s recalcitrance creates risks for the economy by “whipping up an extraordinary degree of uncertainty that, if prolonged much further, will act as a drag on what is at best a nascent and fickle economic recovery.”
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By Polityk | 11/14/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Georgia Hand Tally of Presidential Vote Gets Underway
Election officials in Georgia’s 159 counties started counting ballots Friday morning for a hand tally of the presidential race that stems from an audit required by state law.
The law requires that one race be audited by hand to check that the machines counted the ballots accurately, not because of any suspected problems with the results.
Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger chose to audit the presidential race and said the tight margin — Democrat Joe Biden leads Republican President Donald Trump by 14,000 votes — meant a full hand count was necessary.
In Cobb County, in suburban Atlanta, several dozen two-person audit teams wearing face masks as a precaution against coronavirus sat at tables in a large room at a county event center in Marietta as they began counting absentee ballots. At each table, one auditor picked up a ballot read the candidate’s name aloud and then passed it to the other auditor, who also said the name aloud before placing the ballot in a clearly marked tray corresponding to the candidate’s name.
As they worked, the room was quiet aside from the shuffling of papers and auditors saying, “Trump” or “Biden.”
A similar scene occurred in counties across the state as the count began.
At the Chatham County board of elections annex, a big warehouse on the south side of Savannah, about 60 auditors wearing masks listened as a supervisor ran through how the process would work, then watched a training video before beginning the count a little after 10 a.m.
At the Floyd County administration building in Rome, in north Georgia, pairs of masked auditors sitting at eight plastic folding tables were sworn in at 9 a.m. and the ballots arrived a few minutes later. Republican and Democratic monitors were also sworn in to watch the counting. The party monitors were allowed to circulate among the auditing stations while several other observers were kept back by a black plastic chain.
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger speaks during a news conference in Atlanta, Nov. 11, 2020.Even as the count began, Raffensperger was self-quarantining as a precaution after his wife tested positive Thursday for the coronavirus. The secretary of state’s office has instructed county election officials to complete the audit by 11:59 p.m. Wednesday. The deadline for the state to certify the results is Nov. 20.
Deputy Secretary of State Jordan Fuchs told The Associated Press that Raffensperger tested negative for the virus and said the secretary’s quarantine will not affect the audit.
County election staffers will work with the paper ballots in batches, dividing them into piles for each candidate. Then they will count each pile by hand, Fuchs said.
The audit is a new requirement that was included in a 2019 law that also provided guidelines that the state used to purchase a new election system from Dominion Voting Systems for more than $100 million.
The final numbers in the audit count will almost certainly be slightly different from the numbers previously reported by the counties but the overall outcome should remain the same, said Gabriel Sterling, who oversaw the implementation of the state’s new voting system for the secretary of state’s office.
The results will not be released piecemeal as the counties finish counting but instead will be announced once the full tally is complete, he said, adding that the results of the new count from the audit is what will be certified.
There is no mandatory recount law in Georgia, but state law provides that option to a trailing candidate if the margin is less than 0.5 percentage points. Biden’s lead stood at 0.28 percentage points as of Thursday afternoon.
Once the results from the audit are certified, the losing campaign can request that recount, which will be done using scanners that read and tally the votes, Raffensperger said.
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By Polityk | 11/14/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Parler: A New Social Media Hangout for Conservatives to Vent, Plan
When Twitter started blocking President Donald Trump’s postings claiming widespread voter fraud, some cheered. Others started looking for the social media exits.
They found a new option at Parler.
Fed up with what they see as an anti-conservative bias by managers of the major social media platforms, Trump supporters are telling their followers on Twitter and Facebook to “Follow me on Parler.”
From the French word “to speak” or “to talk” but pronounced “PAR-lor,” the social media app is a lot like Twitter, with users posting messages and following topics searchable as hashtags.
Launched in 2018 in Nevada, Parler welcomed newcomers to “a non-biased, free speech social media focused on protecting user’s rights.”
Over the past year, conservative celebrities have flocked to Parler, a trend that has accelerated since the 2020 U.S. election. As Twitter and Facebook tried to tamp down misinformation about the election, more than 4 million accounts were launched on the app within days, the company says.
Among Parler users are Senator Ted Cruz, a Texas Republican, and Fox News host Sean Hannity.
Posts on Parler are called “parlays.” One on Thursday, under the hashtag #StoptheSteal, said “Shocker Pro Marxist Pope Francis congratulates Crooked Joe!”
“To parlay is to have a discussion bridging the differences,” said Amy Peikoff, Parler’s chief policy officer. “Coming to an understanding between two different viewpoints, and this is the sort of discussion that we want to foster on Parler.”
Previous alternatives to Facebook and Twitter have popped up in the U.S. claiming to be true bastions of free speech. Gab, which became a haven for neo-Nazis, was booted from the app stores of Apple and Google because it didn’t take down hate speech.
But the popularity of Parler – and other right-wing sites such as MeWe and Rumble, a video site – comes amid growing pressure on social media firms to do more to monitor their sites, particularly addressing misinformation about voting and the election results.
Twitter, Facebook and to a lesser extent Google, the owner of YouTube, have put labels on tweets, posts and videos that claim election fraud. In some cases, they stopped the content from being shared and spreading.
Much of the conversation on Parler echoes Trump’s unsupported claim that the November 3 election was stolen by Democrats through massive voter fraud. #StoptheSteal is a top hashtag for those who claim without proof that former Vice President Joe Biden, the projected winner of the 2020 presidential race, stole the election.
Last week, Facebook took down a Stop the Steal group that had gained more than 300,000 users in 24 hours. Facebook said it stopped the group because it was trying to incite violence.
“The group was organized around the delegitimization of the election process, and we saw worrying calls for violence from some members of the group,” a Facebook spokesman told The New York Times.
Parler users have also crossed that line at times: An Arkansas police chief used the site to urge violence against Democrats he claimed were preventing Trump’s reelection. When the posts appeared in news stories, his public account was removed and he was forced to resign.
While the Parler algorithm does not promote posts to keep users engaged, the company says it is serious about its commitment to free speech and does not block extremist content.
“The fact that we don’t block out the content from various extremists does not mean that our goal is to further all of those views,” said Parler’s Peikoff. “What we are planning to do is give the widest freedom possible so that people can have a full discussion.”
For years, the leading social media companies have been criticized for their finely tuned algorithms designed to boost users’ time spent on the sites. That has led to some users receiving a stream of increasingly extremist content on their feeds, according to Michael Karanicolas, the Wikimedia fellow at the Yale School of Law.
The rise of Parler, he said, “potentially suggests that if platforms do try and steer people away from these echo chambers and steer people away from what they want, the people will just migrate elsewhere.”
There is one potential customer that Parler has not yet managed to attract: Trump, himself.
While @TeamTrump, Trump’s reelection campaign, is on the site with 2 million followers, the president isn’t on Parler, yet.
With nearly 89 million followers on Twitter, Trump is still tweeting, even as Twitter has been putting warning labels on more of his tweets.
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By Polityk | 11/13/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Biden Wins Arizona, Increasing Electoral College Lead
U.S. President-elect Joe Biden is the winner in the southwestern state of Arizona, according to major U.S. news outlets, adding to his electoral victory even as President Donald Trump refuses to acknowledge defeat.
With more than 99 percent of the votes counted in the state, Biden leads President Donald Trump by about 11,000 votes.
The New York Times, CNN, NBC News and The Washington Post were among the news organizations Thursday that projected Biden the winner in Arizona, historically a Republican stronghold. Fox News and Associated Press called Arizona for Biden last week.
Edison Research also has projected Biden the winner in Arizona, giving him 290 electoral votes in the state-by-state Electoral College that determines the outcome of the election.
Biden had previously cleared the 270 vote threshold to win the White House, paving the way for his inauguration on Jan. 20.
Trump, a Republican, has repeatedly made unfounded claims that he was defeated by widespread election fraud. But a statement released Thursday by the federal Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, established by Trump in 2018, said the Nov. 3 election was the most secure in U.S. history. The agency’s declaration was the most direct rejection to date of Trump’s campaign to undermine the integrity of the election.
State election officials also report no serious irregularities while Trump’s legal challenges have failed in court.
While Biden is the projected winner of the presidential election, results are subject to legal challenges and recounts.
States are required to meet a Dec. 8 deadline to certify their vote counts and pick electors for the Electoral College, which will officially select the new president on Dec. 14.
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By Polityk | 11/13/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
China Congratulates Biden on Election Victory
China on Friday extended its congratulations to U.S. President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris.Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin made a statement at a regular daily briefing.“We extend congratulations to Mr. Biden and Ms. Harris,” Wenbin said. “We have been following the reaction to the U.S. presidential election of both the United States and the international community,” he said without elaborating on his country’s delay.“We respect the choice of the American people. Meanwhile we understand the results of the U.S. election will be determined according to U.S. laws and procedures,” Wenbin said.Biden is projected to become U.S. president on Jan. 20 based on what is deemed to be an insurmountable lead in the ongoing vote counting from the Nov. 3 election. The results remain subject to court challenges and recounts, and will not be official until certified by the individual states, which must happen no later than Dec. 8.China, along with Russia, did not join other governments last week in congratulating Biden after he was projected Saturday to have secured enough Electoral College votes in the election to win the U.S. presidency.Under a Biden administration political analysts expect few changes in U.S.-China relations, which have recently been tense due to President Donald Trump’s criticism of Beijing’s trade and human rights record and accusations of spying and technology theft.
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By Polityk | 11/13/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
What Is the Fate of Trump’s Border Wall?
Joe Biden, projected to become America’s 46th president in January, has vowed to stop constructing a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border — a centerpiece of President Donald Trump’s presidency. VOA’s Elizabeth Lee reports.
Camera: Spike Johnson and Christian von Preysing Producer: Elizabeth Lee
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By Polityk | 11/13/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Biden Agenda Depends on Battle for Senate
The balance of power in the U.S. Congress will come down to just two Senate races in one Southern state – Georgia — where the presidential contest remains too close to call. As VOA’s Congressional Correspondent Katherine Gypson reports, those two Senate seats will determine if there is a divided government during President-elect Joe Biden’s first two years.
Camera: Adam Greenbaum Producer: Katherine Gypson
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By Polityk | 11/13/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
No Voting System Deleted or Lost Votes in US Election, Security Groups Say
Election security officials have no evidence that ballots were deleted or lost by voting systems in this month’s U.S. election, two security groups said in a statement released Thursday by the lead U.S. cybersecurity agency. “There is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes, or was in any way compromised,” the groups said about the November 3 election won by Joe Biden, a Democrat. Republican President Donald Trump has repeatedly made unsubstantiated claims of electoral fraud and has yet to concede. The groups, the Election Infrastructure Government Coordinating Council Executive Committee (GCC) and the Election Infrastructure Sector Coordinating Council (SCC), said the election was the most secure in U.S. history. “While we know there are many unfounded claims and opportunities for misinformation about the process of our elections, we can assure you we have the utmost confidence in the security and integrity of our elections and you should, too,” the groups said in the statement released by the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA). CISA, led by the top U.S. cybersecurity official, Christopher Krebs, runs a website that debunks misinformation about the election. The security groups said all the states with close results in the race have paper records of each vote, which can be counted if necessary.
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By Polityk | 11/13/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Grief, Anger, Disbelief: Trump Voters Face Biden’s Victory
When Joan Martin heard that Joe Biden had been declared the winner of the presidential election, the retired nurse and avowed supporter of President Donald Trump was deeply unsettled. To steel herself, she thought about how her household weathered Hurricane Katrina when it battered her hometown of Picayune, Mississippi, in 2005.
As the storm blew toward the town, Martin rushed out into her yard to carry her 85 show chickens to safety. Outside, howling winds lashed her family’s barn, lifting the edges of the roof off its moorings.
“The next day they (the chickens) were very concerned about the changes in the yard — we had trees down,” said Martin, 79. “They were very eyes-wide. But within two days, they said, ‘Oh, yeah, we can deal with this,’ and they did. So I have to follow their lead.”
Across the country, many of the 71.9 million people who voted for Trump — especially his loyal, passionate base — are working through turbulent emotions in the wake of his loss. Grief, anger and shock are among the feelings expressed by supporters who assumed he would score a rock-solid victory — by a slim margin, maybe easily, perhaps even by a landslide.
There is also denial. Many are skeptical of the results, saying they don’t trust the media’s race call for Biden, the way election officials counted the ballots, the entire voting system in America. Their views echo the unsupported claims Trump has made since Election Day.
This despite the fact that state officials and election experts say the 2020 election unfolded smoothly across the country and without widespread irregularities. Trump and Republicans have pointed to isolated problems, but many are explained by human error. Many of the Trump campaign’s legal challenges have been dismissed in court. And with Biden leading Trump by solid margins in key battleground states, none of those issues would have any impact on the outcome of the election.Daniel Echebarria, a 39-year-old supporter of President Donald Trump, poses for a picture in Carson City, Nev., where he works as a teacher.Still, any fragment of possibility is enough for some Trump supporters. Their comments lay out the political challenge ahead for the president-elect: The longer Trump casts doubt on the legitimacy of Biden’s win, the harder it will be for the new president to unite a riven country, as he has said he wants to do.”I’m really not in a live and let live mood,” said Daniel Echebarria, a 39-year-old school teacher who lives in Sparks, Nevada.
Echebarria said he was surprised by the election results, questioned some of the numbers and would like to see the president continue with his legal challenges. But he also said he doesn’t consider the result “a big rig job” and doesn’t want to see Trump deny the results into January. Still, he’s not feeling particularly united, either.
Echebarria said he believes Democrats never gave Trump a chance to govern and cites the Russia investigation and the impeachment trial as examples.
“I think that the president was prohibited from getting a lot of his agenda done because so much time and effort had to be put against defending against these,” he said.
Several Trump supporters interviewed by The Associated Press in recent days were rankled by widespread celebrations of Biden’s win in liberal cities. They saw hypocrisy in the public, outdoor gatherings after Democrats condemned Trump supporters for attending big rallies — some were held indoors — amid the coronavirus pandemic.
“Sad” is how Lori Piotrowski sums up her mood. The president of the Boulder City Republican Women club in Nevada at first sounds much like any other deflated supporter.
“You always want your candidate to win. You’re a little let down. You worked hard,” she said.
But Piotrowski also described herself as “extremely” surprised by the result of the election. She’s struggling to reconcile her version of the campaign with the results. She says she saw so many images of large Trump rallies in the final days. On a recent drive from Las Vegas to Reno — through rural, GOP-leaning Nevada — she saw only Trump signs and banners, she said.
“The votes didn’t reflect that amount of enthusiasm. I just find that very surprising,” she said. “It makes me wonder.”
Biden won Nevada by racking up votes in the state’s urban areas.
Piotrowski, like many Trump supporters, wants to see Trump’s legal challenges continue. A massive surge in mail voting and the slower tally of those votes has made the vote count look unfamiliar and strange. Piotrowski said it concerns her that races were called with so many ballots outstanding, although that is often the case.
“It just seems to me that there’s a lot of things that can be improved in the system so that people felt more confident,” she said.
She said she hasn’t listened to any of Biden’s speeches since Election Day.
Za Awng, of Aurora, Colorado, is also suspicious of the vote count.
Awng, who came to the U.S. as a refugee from Myanmar, has embraced Trump as a politician who echoes his conviction that China’s influence in the world must be sharply curtailed, and as one who shares his Christian values.
This spring, Awng lost his job as a chef for two months when the pandemic forced the closure of the restaurant where he works. Back at work now, he credits Trump with working hard over the last four years to improve the economy. It was hard for him to grasp how the president could lose.
“I believe there is something wrong,” he said, pointing to what appear to be Democratic shifts in the tally but were a result of mail-in votes being counted later. Democrats were more likely than Republicans to cast mail ballots after Trump baselessly declared mail voting fraudulent.
“I hope there will be counting again and maybe it will change,” he said.
Even in less tense times, Jim Czebiniak seeks solace in hours of evening prayer. So when Czebiniak, an avid Trump supporter who lives in the upstate community of Knox, New York, heard that Biden had been declared the winner, he turned once again to worship in a search for answers.
“First of all, I went to the Lord and I asked him why, why is it going like this? The Lord said, ‘Because I’m working on stuff. Just relax and let things work themselves out,'” said Czebiniak, 72, who is semi-retired from a career writing custom software.
“To quote what’s-his-name from the Rolling Stones, Mick Jagger: ‘You can’t always get what you want,'” Czebiniak said.
Still, Czebiniak said he is far from ready to accept a Biden presidency. He cited several unsupported claims made by the Trump campaign.
“The election isn’t really called yet,” Czebiniak said, days after all the major U.S. television networks and the AP examined vote counts in key states to declare Biden the overall winner. “I don’t trust anything that’s going on there with all this vote counting.”
Unlike many Trump supporters, Michelle Sassouni wasn’t shocked by the outcome of the election or the aftermath.
The 29-year-old in Tampa, Florida, is an active member of her region’s Young Republicans Club and a co-host of a video show, “Moderately Outraged.” She floated the idea of Biden’s nomination, and potential to win, months ago.
“Everyone laughed at me on the show,” she said. With many liberal friends, she had seen the strong opposition to Trump. She even understands it somewhat. “I don’t love everything he does, but I voted for him because I’m a Republican.”
But Sassouni doesn’t see danger in Trump’s vow to fight the results in court. People need to be reassured of the results, and a court fight might give them confidence, she said.
“If you voted for Joe Biden, wouldn’t you want to know that he won fair and square so that there’s not this cloud over his head?” she asked. “If half the country believes there was some sort of election tampering, then that creates distrust in the system, that creates distrust in Western democracy as a whole.”
Martin, the retiree in Mississippi, says she’s planning to resume her daily life, tending to her animals and avoiding talking about the country’s change in leadership as a way to deal with the stress and trepidation she feels.
“I’ll go out in the yard to check and talk to my chickens and say my old-fashioned hymns and get by,” she said.
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By Polityk | 11/13/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
After Trump, Southeast Asia Craves Reliable Ally in Biden
A Joe Biden presidency is likely to involve a deeper U.S. engagement with Southeast Asia, some analysts say, offering trade for their pandemic-hit economies and security leverage against regional heavyweight China—but also bringing uncomfortable questions on rights and democracy.Southeast Asia knows Biden from his time as vice president in the administration of President Barack Obama, whose “Asia pivot” lavished diplomatic capital and resources on a strategic trade and defense vision for the region aimed at expanding economies that are home to 650 million people and checking China’s march.President Donald Trump’s approach to the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations has seen defense sales, bilateral trade deals and promises of support in the face of an increasingly assertive Beijing, which has ramped up its bases in the contested South China Sea.Trump also brought threats to the same countries, however, over trade deficits. The sudden withdrawal from the Obama-era Trans-Pacific Partnership after years of talks on the world’s largest low-tariff trade zone left allies wondering whether the U.S. could still be counted on as a long-term partner.Now, ASEAN leaders are expected this weekend to sign a rival trade deal, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, anchored by China.Some analysts predict that under Biden, America will be a more visible ally.“Biden will reconstruct US foreign policy in Southeast Asia,” said Ade M Wirasenjaya, who lectures on International Relations at the Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta, Indonesia.“Biden has political insignia with Democrat and predecessor Obama. He will be more calm and build relationships in a multilateralist way than Trump.”Biden—and his top officials—also will show up, said Emeritus Professor Carl Thayer of the University of New South Wales, in Australia.“President-elect Biden has already proclaimed ‘we’re back!’ meaning that top U.S. officials will turn up for high-level meetings with their ASEAN counterparts,” he said.Trump skipped several key ASEAN summits, while China routinely sends top leaders.Trump’s trade war with China also left blisters across the region’s export-reliant economies—some countries benefiting from a shift of supply chains, others losing investment from battered Chinese firms as protectionist measures toxified the trade environment.FILE – President Donald Trump and Chinese Vice Premier Liu He have lunch after signing the ‘Phase 1’ U.S.-China trade agreement, in the State Dining Room of the White House, Jan. 15, 2020, in Washington.The projected change in the White House has been welcomed by ASEAN leaders, many stunned by America’s sudden retreat from leadership on major global issues like trade and climate change.Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha, whose country is Southeast Asia’s second biggest economy and Washington’s oldest Asian ally, said he “looks forward to working closely” with the incoming president, while Halimah Yacob, Singapore’s president took to Facebook to praise the president-elect and his running mate, Vice President-elect Kamala Harris.“This is the historic moment for women minorities in the U.S., and around the world,” Yacob said on Facebook.Elephant in the room?There may be awkward conversations, however, once Biden takes office in January.Biden will “pay attention to issues related to human rights and democratic development, which has been overlooked by the Trump administration,” said Kavi Chongkittavorn, a Bangkok-based veteran diplomatic commentator.Trump paid less public attention than his predecessors to pro-democracy movements and questions of human rights, dismaying activists from Thailand to Cambodia. Analysts say that served to embolden regional strongmen such as Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte and Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen, as well as the ex-generals who stack Thailand’s government, and even Vietnam’s communist leadership.Kavis said Biden will be more attentive and “zero-in on Thailand and its future strategic role,” said Kavi.Trade and securityWhile the TPP deal is unlikely to re-emerge as it was, Southeast Asian leaders who are meeting this week in Vietnam will be hoping for swift reassurances from a Biden administration on free trade.Equally, they will be keen to have a reboot of the climate change agenda, which they see as integral to the future of a region hit by historic droughts and storms.Their main concern, though, is the rapid advance of China. It is now the biggest trading partner with ASEAN and a military power with its eyes firmly set on dominating the South China Sea, as well as completing a lattice of debt-funded infrastructure projects to realize its Belt and Road Initiative ambitions.Trump had promised to turn up the economic and military heat on China in a second term, offering Southeast Asian states—an area his administration defined as the Indo-Pacific—valuable leverage in their negotiations with their neighborhood superpower.Biden will have to address the same concerns, experts say.“No matter who runs the White House, there’s still an increasing convergence of strategic interests in the South China Sea and bilateral economic ties are still flourishing,” said Le Hong Hiep, an academic at the Contemporary Southeast Asia ISEAS – Singapore based Yusof Ishak Institute.First, though, he will have to seize the chance to remake old friendships and show that America remains a long-term ally that will not divide and rule a Southeast Asian bloc already being fractured by China’s wealth and influence.“Biden will become a strategic partner with ASEAN,” Wirasenjaya said, “particularly to reduce China’s aggression in the South China Sea.”
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By Polityk | 11/13/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Phone Calls Play Key Role in Transatlantic Relations
The anxieties of Britain’s ruling Conservatives about how Anglo-American relations may unfold under a Biden administration were partly calmed midweek when President-elect Joe Biden chose to phone Prime Minister Boris Johnson ahead of conversations with France’s Emmanuel Macron and Germany’s Angela Merkel.“Special relationship maintained as Johnson is first on Joe Biden’s call list,” the Times of London proclaimed on its front page Wednesday. The two men spoke for around 25 minutes. Britain’s newspapers — and Downing Street officials privately — appeared gleeful, too, that Biden phoned Johnson ahead of talking with Ireland’s Micheal Martin.“The prime minister warmly congratulated Joe Biden on his election as president of the United States,” a spokesman said. “They discussed the close and long-standing relationship between our countries and committed to building on this partnership in the years ahead, in areas such as trade and security, including through NATO.”About-faceSpeaking in the House of Commons Wednesday, Johnson hailed his “refreshing” conversation with Biden, and in his enthusiasm misspoke, describing Donald Trump as the “previous president.” Trump once described Johnson as “Britain Trump,” lauding him for championing Brexit and embracing him as a kindred spirit.Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson speaks during the weekly question-time debate at the House of Commons in London, Britain, Nov. 11, 2020.“One of the many merits of the excellent conversation I had yesterday with president-elect Joe Biden was that we were strongly agreed on the need for once again the UK and the US to stand together to stick up for our values around the world,” Johnson told lawmakers.Speaking later Wednesday during a visit to a food distribution center in the British capital, Johnson said: “Sticking up for democracy around the world, human rights, free trade, NATO – Joe Biden is a very strong believer in the transatlantic alliance and indeed the special relationship — and above all climate change.”But there was no mention by Johnson, or his aides, about whether the pair had discussed during the phone call a key issue that’s been dividing Britain’s Conservatives and America’s Democrats — Johnson’s threat to ignore parts of Britain’s withdrawal Brexit agreement with the European Union regarding Northern Ireland.A Biden spokesman later said the issue had been raised. The Democrats have warned that Britain’s exit from the European bloc should not impact the island of Ireland or undermine peace there.Deputy Secretary of State Antony Blinken testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington, Sept. 29, 2016, before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on Syria.In a podcast discussion last year, Blinken expressed concern that the Good Friday Agreement could be compromised because of Brexit. “The United States played a pivotal role in getting peace in Northern Ireland,” he said. “It certainly is a lot harder without the EU and no one, of course, wants to go back to a hard border between Northern Ireland and Ireland,” he added.Germany“I think their instincts will be to downgrade Britain a bit and try to work with Germany more on transatlantic relations,” said Kundnani. “But then I suspect it will become apparent pretty quickly that on several major issues, particularly around China and Russia, Germany won’t be as cooperative. I am curious how then the Biden administration reacts and how it recalibrates?”British diplomats appear to be planning for just that eventuality. Peter Ricketts, a former British national security adviser, told British broadcasters that Biden won’t come with any sentimental regard for the British. “Britain is going to have to earn its keep with Washington and show we are working in ways they help the American interest as well,” he said.
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By Polityk | 11/12/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
US President-Elect Joe Biden Talks with More World Leaders
U.S. President-elect Joe Biden has held additional congratulatory telephone calls with world leaders as he moves forward with preparations ahead of his inauguration January 20. The calls come as President Donald Trump refuses to concede following the November 3 election and challenges the results.The Biden-Harris transition team says Biden spoke with Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga and South Korean President Moon Jae-in during separate calls Wednesday, thanking them for their congratulations. The statement said the conversations covered climate change, COVID-19 and strengthening democracy.Biden spoke earlier in the week with leaders from Britain, Canada France, Germany and Ireland, according to transition officials. NATO ally Turkey also reached out, according to reports.Japan’s prime minister, Yoshihide Suga, says he and President-elect Biden had a “meaningful conversation” about the importance of their countries’ alliance and working together on mutually important issues, particularly regional security.Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga attends to deliver his policy speech at the upper house of parliament in Tokyo, Oct. 26, 2020.Suga told reporters in Tokyo he congratulated Biden and Kamala Harris as the first female vice president-elect. There was no mention of Trump’s refusal to concede.The Japanese prime minister told Biden regional security is an increasingly important issue. “I said [to Biden] that the Japan-U.S. alliance, as the security environment around Japan is turning increasingly severe, is indispensable for the peace and prosperity not only for the region but also for international society, and we need to further strengthen it.”He said Biden agreed, and told Suga he looked forward to strengthening the U.S.-Japan alliance and working together on achieving peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific region.China has built and militarized man-made islands in the South China Sea and is pressing its claim to virtually all of the sea’s key fisheries and waterways. Japan is concerned about China’s claim to the Japanese-controlled Senkaku Islands, called Diaoyu in China, in the East China Sea.Suga said he and Biden agreed to meet as soon as possible. Suga was elected in September, replacing Shinzo Abe, who resigned for health reasons.
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By Polityk | 11/12/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
New Trump Lawsuit Aims to Stop Certification of Pennsylvania Election Results
President Donald Trump’s campaign launched a new legal effort this week aimed at stopping the certification of election results in Pennsylvania, as the president continued to refuse to concede to President-elect Joe Biden. White House correspondent Patsy Widakuswara has the latest.
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By Polityk | 11/12/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Trump Campaign Launches New Lawsuit in Pennsylvania
President Donald Trump’s campaign launched a new legal effort this week aimed at stopping the certification of election results in Pennsylvania, as the president continued to refuse to concede to President-elect Joe Biden. White House correspondent Patsy Widakuswara has the latest.
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By Polityk | 11/12/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
