America that returns | US elections

Less than two months after his inauguration as the 46th president of the United States, Joe Biden’s roadmap, based on three pillars – coronavirus control and economic recovery, reopening to the world and fighting climate change – was confirmed when we know the identity of those who will be in charge of applying it. The first appointments of his Administration, awaiting confirmation by the Senate following the second round in Georgia, in January – an unknown factor that adds suspense at the beginning of his mandate -, build on the experience in the Administration and are figures rooted in the institution democratic. It will be up to them to restore global presence and presence in the United States, through the resumption of traditional alliances and renewed leadership, as well as to heal internal wounds: from the ravages of the pandemic to a political polarization unprecedented in decades or the fate of the dreamers, after a republican mandate in which immigrants have repeatedly found themselves on the ropes.

It is a question, as Biden himself reiterated during the campaign, of transforming immense challenges into opportunities, in a context of profound, multiform global crisis. Just one example: to bring the country out of economic stagnation caused by the pandemic, your government will invest specifically in the clean energy sector, with the broader goal of creating ten million new jobs. verdes as part of its ambitious Green New Deal. Job creation is a pillar, and it is not for nothing that economic policy has been entrusted to a labor market expert, the new secretary to the Treasury, Janet Yellen. It will also have to deal with Trump’s inherited disputes such as the poisoned trade relationship with China, which has colonized bilateral diplomacy, or arbitrate the pending Tiktok case, paradigmatic of the law banning foreign investment in strategic sectors, and which is within the competence of his department.

To address the international crises and rebuild the the stateAbused by four years of isolationism and broken commitments – not to mention Trump’s flirtations with authoritarian leaders – the Democratic president will delegate to two senior officials who master the keys to diplomacy: the new secretary of state, Anthony Blinken, a multilateralist confessed , and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, a stump under the Clinton and Obama mandates of the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, quit three years later. From both of us we can expect greater harshness towards China, greater proximity to Europe after the Brexit stream and a decisive commitment to diplomacy and de-escalation, without excluding a more determined interventionism unaware of the doubts that they stopped Obama in the face of the Syrian Civil War.

At a time when the stability of the Middle East is being altered by Israeli movements, Blinken and Sullivan support the policy of an outstretched hand towards Iran, with the recovery of the nuclear pact and the possibility of easing sanctions if Tehran surrenders. in its uranium enrichment program. All of this, of course, if an unforeseen event in the final period of Trump’s term does not blow up the precarious balance of forces in the region. The likely conciliatory spirit with Iran will have no equivalent in relations with Venezuela or Cuba, as Sullivan defends diplomatically by forcing the eviction of Nicolás Maduro and renewed pressure on Havana to isolate the Chavista leader. For the rest of Maduro’s allies (China and Russia) a crackdown is also foreseen to distance their interests from the needs of Caracas.

Some of Biden’s appointments were not well received by his party’s progressive sector. Three of the four representatives of the group known as The Squad, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib, asked him this week not to put his collaborator Bruce Reed at the head of the Budget Office, considering him a “deficit hawk” and they have spoken out in favor of cutting Medicare, the public health plan for the elderly. Faced with the hypothetical change of presidency if his mandate does not end, closing the ranks of the party is another task in which the Democrat is already working, second The New York Times. The election of Reema Dodin, of Palestinian descent, as deputy director of the White House Office of Legislative Affairs, is a nod to the progressive wing and reflects the diversity that Biden has promised to embody his team; also a greater presence of women, starting with vice president Kamala Harris. Meanwhile, the appointment of several Jews to senior positions (Blinken, Yellen; Alejandro Mayorkas, new head of immigration, or Ron Klain, chief of staff) has pleased the powerful lobby American Jew, like Israel, the strategic ally who now fears a rapprochement with Iran.

The professionalism of the Biden team members is indisputable, unlike an outgoing administration where a daughter and son-in-law, those of Donald Trump, served as court advisors with no training or experience for it. His expertise seems to guarantee, at least, knowledge of the facts at a critical moment, when the pandemic continues to multiply exponentially (176,000 new cases a day this week; about 270,000 deaths), although the imminence of a vaccine and the confidence it has generated in equity markets, which hit all-time highs this week, allowing us to have some hope of a near-term recovery. Yellen’s presence in the Cabinet is by no means unrelated to signs of optimism: after learning about his appointment, the Dow Jones has crossed the psychological barrier of 30,000 points for the first time. However, the first hurdle will be the new stimulus package to finance infrastructure investment and the resulting job creation, which has been stuck in Congress for months.

The climate czar, John Kerry is the icing on the cake, in terms of seniority and Democratic pedigree, of the future Biden cabinet. Former senator, former secretary of state and former presidential candidate, Kerry, contemporary of the president, “will fight climate change full-time as a special climate envoy, and sit on the National Security Council,” with ministerial rank, according to the transition team. Since leaving the Secretary of State, Kerry has turned to the environment through World War Zero, an international coalition calling for urgent action against the climate crisis. Biden’s ecological defense, so rooted in the regeneration of the economy, arouses suspicion from important sectors, such as the oil industry and fracking, but their reluctance seems, as in the case of the pandemic, the health dilemma versus economy, a circle as voracious as it is vicious: preserving the environment in exchange for ruining the economy? Or is it the other way around? The answer to the enigma will be the first chapter of the white paper which is the new democratic mandate.

Sign up here at newsletter on elections in the United States