15 JULY

Masked diplomacy

In 2020, personal protective equipment has merged with partisan politics. As USSC’s Dr Gorana Grgic pointed out to ABC News at the start of the month, President Trump’s choice to avoid wearing face masks signals that he is “strong,” that “life is back to normal,” and she continued to say “dismissing and questioning experts is what he’s been doing for most of his political career.” But this changed on Saturday when President Trump donned a mask for his visit to a military hospital. The supply of masks has also been used as a tool for international coercion and exploitation known as “mask diplomacy” as discussed in a USSC webinar on 19 May.

Both the Biden and Trump campaigns have been trying to move the focus beyond the pandemic. The Biden-Sanders Joint Task Force has given the most detailed policy positions to date in an effort to solidify a democratic coalition that will turn up to the polls in November. The Trump campaign also has the opportunity to return to their greatest hits with the potential to replace not just one, but possibly two Supreme Court justices with speculation circling about Justices Clarence Thomas and Ruth Bader Ginsberg. However, the Trump campaign now must split attention to run damage control for the new book from his niece, Mary Trump.

VIDEO

Election Watch
The vice-presidential sweepstakes

Were you unable to make it to the latest instalment in our Election Watch series The vice-presidential sweepstakes featuring Dr Jennifer Lawless, Kim Hoggard, Professor Simon Jackman and Zoe Daniel?

You can now watch the full webinar on our YouTube channel!

NEWS WRAP

No Stone unturned

Roger Stone granted presidential clemency
President Trump has attracted scrutiny after commuting the sentence of Roger Stone, his long-time friend and advisor who was convicted in 2019 of lying to Congress and witness tampering during the Russia probe. READ MORE HERE
US could call Australia to back stance on South China Sea
Australia could face renewed pressures to back the United States' stance on the South China Sea after the Trump administration outlined its view that most of Beijing’s territorial claims in the region are illegal. Speaking to the Australian Financial Review, Ashley Townshend, USSC Director of Foreign Policy and Defence, said the million-dollar question was what the US was going to do to back up its stronger diplomatic stance. READ MORE HERE
Trump wears mask in public for first time
After repeated refusal, President Trump was photographed wearing a mask during a visit to the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. This comes 99 days after the Center for Disease Control recommended Americans don face coverings to help stop the spread of COVID-19. READ MORE HERE
Trump’s WHO withdrawal putting lives at ‘grave risk’
The Trump administration’s decision to leave the World Health Organization is putting lives at ‘grave risk’ USSC Non-Resident Fellow Associate Professor Adam Kamradt-Scott says in his latest article in The Conversation. READ MORE HERE

They wanted me to be the ham in their ham sandwich because they knew the Mueller report, particularly on Russia, was a dud. It was a goose egg. They had nothing.

Roger Stone
Interview on Fox News after President Trump commuted his prison sentence
13 July 2020

ANALYSIS

Only a Trump shellacking will let Biden follow a truly left-wing agenda

Associate Professor Brendon O'Connor
Associate Professor in American Politics

The great American historian Richard Hofstadter described Franklin Delano Roosevelt's New Deal as having a "social democratic tinge". However, since Roosevelt's presidency in the 1930s and early 1940s, social democratic ideas have struggled to have much influence on American public policy. Socialist ideas have had even less influence. There are signs that this is changing: in the primaries of 2016 the popularity of the self-confessed democratic socialist Bernie Sanders and the social democrat Elizabeth Warren suggested Americans were opening their minds up to different economic and political approaches.

Of course, neither of them was ultimately victorious in the Democratic primaries, but the enthusiasm they engendered and the number of votes they received was remarkable in a country that has long been so hostile and unreceptive to left-wing ideas. Undoubtedly, Sanders' and Warren's campaigns pulled Joe Biden's candidacy significantly to the left, making him a more progressive candidate than Barack Obama was in either 2008 or 2012, when he campaigned as a centrist Democrat.

A fascinating question to consider is: could the Biden presidency be the most social democratic administration since FDR, or is Biden more likely to retreat to the cautious centre - the position Obama largely occupied? One sign that a Biden administration would be light on serious reform is his claim that he can achieve bipartisan policy changes in Washington. Promoting bipartisanship as a campaign slogan is possibly excusable, but actually believing the Republicans are willing to support expanding Obamacare, raising the minimum wage, facing up to global warming with serious policies, or increasing taxes to fund the sensible governing of America is deluded.

Obama, in his 2008 campaign and his accompanying book, The Audacity of Hope, claimed his skills as a community organiser and his experience in the Illinois Senate would help him achieve bipartisan reforms. An update on that book should be titled The Paucity of Evidence. This time around we have Biden claiming his 36-year career in the US Senate gives him the unique capacity to achieve bipartisan reforms. This remains unlikely until the Republicans experience an electoral shellacking.

The way Trump has handled the COVID-19 pandemic makes a landslide victory for Biden, and the Democrats in the Congress, possible - although far from inevitable. The American public, in polls, is increasingly blaming Trump and his Republican colleagues in the Congress for not solving America's major problems, and in fact often exacerbating many of those problems.

In such a political climate a Democrat-controlled Washington could seize the moment and push for widespread progressive reform. On the environment this is a matter of necessity, and should not be called progressive or left-wing, but simply sensible and in the national interest. The fact that objective science on climate change and now on COVID-19 has been labelled "left-wing" is a damning indictment of how divorced from facts both the Trump administration, and by enabling association, the current Republican party is.

This article is an excerpt from an article originally published in the Canberra Times.

COVID-19: BY THE NUMBERS

Highest daily increase: FL 15,300 | NY 11,571

New York saw its largest daily spike in new cases on 15 April with an increase of 11,571 new COVID-19 cases. On 12 July, Florida recorded 15,300 new cases – 32 per cent more than on New York’s highest day.

Lilian Abbo, an infectious disease expert from the University of Miami Health System, has claimed Florida is the new epicentre of the pandemic. It now sits behind only New York and California for the total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases.

To track the latest trends and numbers, visit our COVID-19 tracker HERE.

VIRTUAL EVENT

A new Cold War? China, America and the geopolitics of COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic has pushed US-China relations to the lowest point in decades. Deep differences over trade, foreign policy and values have been sharpened amid increasingly hostile rhetoric. What is driving these developments and do they signal the dawn of a new Cold War? How is the pandemic and China’s “wolf warrior” diplomacy shaping the geopolitical contest in Asia? What impact are US and Chinese actions and rivalry having on other countries in the Indo-Pacific? And how should Australia best advance its interests amid deteriorating US-China ties, growing strategic competition and a polarising response to the call for an independent inquiry into COVID-19?

To discuss these issues, please join us for a special webinar featuring Ashley Townshend, USSC Director of Foreign Policy and Defence, Dr Lynn Kuok, Shangri-La Dialogue Senior Fellow for Asia-Pacific Security, IISS, and Richard Maude, Executive Director of Policy with the Asia Society Australia, in conversation with Dr Lavina Lee, Senior Lecturer at Macquarie University.

This event is presented in partnership with the Asia Society Policy Institute.

WHEN:
Thursday 16 July 2020, 11am AEST

COST:
Free, but registration is essential

REGISTER NOW

UPCOMING REPORT

Enduring Partners: The US-Australia Investment Relationship
David Uren, Non-Resident Fellow

This report examines the resilience of the investment partnership between Australia and the United States in a time of growing international turbulence.

Subscribe to our research alerts to receive a copy when the report is released on 16 July, 2020.