Transcripts For CSPAN Campaign 2020 Brookings Discussion On 2020 Election Foreign Policy 20240711

Good morning. Im the director for the center of United States in europe. At the bookings institution. I am delighted today to be chairing this important discussion on election 2020 and its implications for u. S. Over the weekend there has been some rapid developments. After a tumultuous few days, i think for everyone, the election was close for many days. So we have a terrific panel this morning to discuss not so much the election but looking forward to next year to see what the implications are for u. S. Foreign policy, for international order, and to talk to parse maybe some of the nuances of last week and what they may mean, particularly that trumpism is alive and well even though the president did not receive a second term and that the senate could still be in the hands of the republicans. Adelman fromic Johns Hopkins school of advanced international study, evan osnos, a staff writer at the new yorker and a nonresident fellow at brookings, tamara wittes, senior fellow at the center for middle east policy at the brookings nuland, an, victoria nonresident at the center for the United States and europe. All have either served in great in senior positions in government which i wont go into at the moment, but you can rest assured that they come equipped with decades of experience at the highest levels, and evan has recently written a book on joe biden which is titled sorry, the title escapes at the moment. It slipped off my screen. It is joe biden, his life and times and what it means for the 2020 election. Evan, lets start with you, if we can. Joe biden has been around for a long time as we heard repeatedly from donald trump. Hes been in office or out of office for about 47 years. He has a long track record on u. S. Foreign policy, in some ways hes a very known quantity but in other ways hes a bit of an enigma. His views have evolved a bit over time. He has a large team that has these debates about Foreign Policy that have been obscured by the trump show and many people in biden world were expecting a repudiation of donald trump, an overwhelming victory that would send a message to the world. He has won a clear victory but it was maybe more close and more marginal than many people anticipated. He may well have a republican and he, of course, has said that his superpower is working with republicans, working with people on the other side of the aisle, so as he sort of contemplates the first few days of his transition and the beginning of his term, how do you think he sort of interprets the results of last week, particularly with the view to what it means as far as Foreign Policy and further for the future of americas global role . Thanks, tom. Yeah, its great to be with my colleagues up here and with all of you who are tuning in. Look, i think there are, as tom mentioned, there are in some ways elements of joe bidens mind, his approach to his diplomacy as to domestic policy that we sometimes overlook or havent really studied in detail until just now. They can help us anticipate some of the things that i think were likely to see. Ill talk just for a minute here about what i think we can broadly describe as an error of of division ata home and abroad. I think thats an important defining piece of this, to understand the period of structural and sustained hostility in the u. S. And in many of its relationships, which will have implications but before we do that i want to talk about president elect bidens theory of diplomacy because, when you talk to him about how he thinks about diplomacy, which is something he cares a great deal about, hell tell you, that he draws somewhat of a distinction between the way its conventionally practiced. He said to me at one point, look, sometimes diplomats get tired because i will say to them im not going to go into a room and say what you want me to say, exactly as you wrote it here, because his basic view, and he would apply this in wilmington or in baghdad or in beijing, is do not tell another person what their interests are. Thats his fundamental idea. They will have a notion of their interests, and as he puts it, you know, in my experience people are generally not open to being persuaded that their own calculation is wrong. What you have to do is show them the basic element of recognition, the facts that that you are hearing them, that you are listening with them. You dont have to pretend you agree but if you can get them into a position that they can trust their own ability to calculate their interests, you are starting over at an advantage over if you come in and tell them why they are wrong. I think another piece of this, thats meaningful is, joe biden and barack obama actually had a very important thing that bound them together when they were joined together on the ticket. Oftentimes president s and vice are shotgun tickets marriages. In this case they had this thing, that tied them. It was this basic belief in the possibility of unification. That you could actually unify people but they used very different tools to do it. In president obamas case, as we know, he had a transcendent story. Literally his own personal story and the power of his eloquence, of his political rhetoric, was able to at home and abroad withstand this process of trying to restore some element of the american image, of american credibility, and that was his approach. You saw that in the significance of his speeches and so on. President elect biden has a different view. He does not pretend frankly that he has that kind of american story that can communicate what the future of the United States is likely to be. What he says is, in fact, i have the relationships. I have these kind of fundamental persontoperson contacts, and most of all, i believe that if you go back to that first principle, that you acknowledge that somebody elses interest may be legitimate, that thats the basis for a meaningful discussion. And ill just very briefly mention one other thing, which is, it is significant that he knows a lot of these people. George at one point said to me, we used to have foreign leaders who went into the senate with joe biden for a long time, we would have foreign leaders come all the time to the senate and my job was to go around and introduce the foreign leaders. I would say over here is senator so and so, then these foreign leaders would say hi, joe. There is a certain they just knew him. And at a moment like now, when the United States frankly looks unfamiliar in so many ways now, in the nature of politics, the nature of our divisions, to our friends and opponents abroad, an element of recognizability is a political asset that i think we sometimes discount. Im going to save specific comments about all the various specific domains, china, europe, and elsewhere because my colleagues will get us going on that and well come back to them in more specifics during q a. Tom, back to you, i think. Thank you, evan. Tamara, you served as Deputy Assistant secretary of state in the middle east for middle Eastern Affairs in the first term of the Obama Administration. You had an opportunity to work with then Vice President biden. Well get into the middle east part of it later on, i think, in the discussion, but just to the question on his sort of outlook, how it might have changed following the election of last week, what hes sort of thinking, you know what do you think hes thinking about the challenges hes facing in the world with still a very divided country at home, and if his Foreign Policy is like to be a little different this week than maybe it would have appeared just before the election . I think that last one is a difficult question, but let me try and start with the broader outlook question. I think that one thing weve seen from joe biden throughout his career, whether its in domestic policy, Foreign Policy, or in politics itself, is an ability to learn and grow and change. This is his not his first run for the presidency, and, you know, across his career, i think, hes just gotten better and better and better at what he does. What evan pointed out about his determination to empathize and to seek out Common Ground, i think these are elements of practical diplomacy that will serve him very well. Hes got the background to hit the ground running, but the challenge he faces coming in, in january, is how much the ground has shifted since he was in the vice presidency. Thats very true in the middle east, where weve seen historic developments over the last decade. Some of which he was in office for and some of which he was not. But its drew across the board. Politics has changed. Transatlantic partners are in a different place now than they were four years ago. And there is a degree of uncertainty in Global Politics that i think has led a number of our traditional partners to selfhelp over the course of the Trump Administration and its not simple to unwind that. So i think his capacity to learn and grow is going to be put to use very, very quickly. But i think hell probably move himself into some of the Common Ground that hes found with partners in the past. Whether that is, you know, the iranian challenge on counterterrorism, on strengthening our sort of coalition of democracies across the world, which is something he spoke about a lot during the campaign, but its hard to see how to put meat on the bones without those good conversations. To hear from them and to find that Common Ground. So no doubt there is a lot of prep work thats been going on, but he will be reaching out and having a lot of conversations. Hell want to hear it for himself. And, you know, hes not going to be able to put these things on pause while he figures it out. Thank you. Thank you, tamara. Thats fascinating. Eric, if we could turn to you next. Youve served in very senior positions in the pentagon and overseas, in the republican administrations. What do you think Mitch Mcconnell and, i guess, the Foreign Policy oriented senators are thinking at the moment . Are they better than 5050 chance that they retain control of the Senate Following the runoffs in georgia on january 5, we need to wait to see, of course, results but if youre looking at it now there is probably a pretty decent chance they remain in control, so they will have control basically of the nomination process, considerable oversight. Obviously, legislation to pass, they are necessary for any legislation to pass, and it has been a pretty divided election. Weve already seen some senators come out and basically back Donald Trumps theory of the case. What do you think mcconnell and some of the other senators are thinking and this is sort of a is there sort of a prospect for cooperation between a Biden Administration and a Republicancontrolled Senate . Thanks, tom. First, its great to be here with you, and with all my colleagues here, with whom i have all sorts of unusual ties. Weve succeeded each other in a variety of positions in government. Tammys parents were exceedingly kind to me when i was an ambassador in turkey, and evans grandparents lived in the same neighborhood my grandparents did in manhattan. Its a great panel and im thrilled to be part of it. Look, the Republican Party certainly the Republican Party of Ronald Reagan has been shattered, and its beyond recognition, in terms of its approach to National Security policy. I think for those of us who were never trump republicans, i was part of two different groups of that ilk, that endorsed Vice President biden, we had hoped for, as you indicated, a bigger repudiation of trump and trumpism and we didnt get it. I think Vice President biden is going to win a pretty solid victory when all the votes are counted. Hes likely to have a slightly higher margin than barack obama did against mitt romney. But its still not the repudiation of trumpism that might have served as a healthy helping cleanser of the republican tendency, particularly in the senate, to enable president trumps worst instincts. And you can see that already in whats happened in the postelection period, when a number of republicans in the senate have jumped like trained seals to respond to tweets from donald jr. , et cetera, about defending his fathers totally undemocratic efforts to cast doubt on the results of the election, which i think is really dangerous for our democracy. And benefits only one person, which is vladimir putin. It might also benefit xi jinping, so it might be more than one. What will happen in the senate . I think senator mcconnell, leader mcconnells instincts remain sort of traditional. Conservative internationalist republican. He does have a longstanding relationship with Vice President biden. I think his instinct is going to want to try and be pragmatic, to get some things done. And i think, in fact, probably some contacts are already beginning to happen between Vice President bidens folks and congressional staffers on the republican side. So i think thats, you know, all to the good but leader mcconnell will have a very large challenge and thats going to be that the Election Results are likely to be ratified in the minds of a number of people that the problem was not the message, it was the messenger. That this was a repudiation of trump, but not necessarily of trumpism. And that, therefore, hostility to trade agreements, hostility to our alliances, are going to be the ticket to success in 2024. And that trump lane i think will be very crowded with a number of candidates, and many of them are going to try and stoke the trump win their own candidacies by being obstructionists, by leading the resistance to a Biden Administration. Mcconnell will have a tough road himself. He is going to need some cooperation from the biden team in helping him to manage that. I dont think it will be as big an issue on the confirmation for cabinet positions, but the subcabinet positions, i think, that are open for confirmation, are going to be a bigger battleground, and that will require some very dexterous cooperation on both sides, which i hope happens because that would be good for the country. Thank you, eric. Toria, youve served in several administrations, in both parties as a Foreign Service officer, very senior levels. Picking up where eric left off, if were likely to see sort of a continuation of trumpism in the Republican Party and in the senate, would you still have some of those International Elements there, internationalist elements there, and a Vice President biden who is sort of naturally kind to bipartisanship, what do you think the best prospects are to sort of recreate, if not the bipartisan consensus, at least, a strong bipartisan view, maybe not shared by everybody in each party, americas leadership role internationally. Thanks, tom. First, its great to be with everybody on this fresh monday morning and with so many patriots and folks who have served their country so well. Listen, biden came up along with most of the senior members of the senate, in a period where the fundamental underpinning was that political fights ended at the waters edge. And when you went out into the world, you went out as a unified and ideally a bipartisan front, to talk to allies and adversaries alike about the challenges and to represent the United States. I think that will be bidens instinct, to try to reach out as eric said, to the mcconnells and ands and cornyns traditional republicans, of his generation, but i think eric is not wrong that on the Foreign Policy and security side, we dont know yet what those who will posture for trump 2024, what the younger folks will take from the Foreign Policy agenda of trump. I thought it was pretty interesting that throughout the trump period, even as some of the more trumpian republicans in the congress supported punishing side, almost trade nobody joined this caravan of trump hostility towards nato and even trump hostility towards the e. U. As an institution or towards allies in general. And over the period of the Trump Administration, this america go it alone, america unilateralism did not have popular support. You know, Public Opinion polling for institutions like nato and the u. N. Went up over this period, and i think that reflects the fact that the American People never really did buy that its better for us, cheaper for us to take on issues like china, issues like the new National Security challenges from high technologies like artificial intelligence, etc. , by ourselves. First and foremost, if we could do it with allies that would be better, cheaper, and more persuasive for us, but secondarily that doing it all alone puts all of the burden of things like sanctions on china on the American Farmer rather than on a broader coalition, and it stands less of a chance for success. So i think bidens instinct obviously will try to be to rebuild a traditionalist Bipartisan Coalition for american leadership. I think there will be a demand on the republican side for a more rigorous approach to some things. China in particular. Than they may have seen from the Obama Administration, but as tammy said, i think thats where president elect biden and his team have evolved anyway. That its time to be far more organized, structured, rigorous, and strong as a Democratic Community in the way we approach russia, china, and some of these other challenges from authoritarians, who want to change the rulesbased system in their favor. So i think he will make a strong effort. I just wanted to underscore a couple of things that evan said, as somebody, you know, who had the honor of traveling with biden and watching him work as a u. S. Diplomat in the last in the Obama Administration, not only does he start from the premise that you cant tell somebody else what their interests are, he starts by trying to understand what the other person on the other side of the table thinks their interests are. And then what their political environment is. Where their is room to maneuver is. And then to try to call the interlocutor on the other site of the table to their higher angels to create a better outcome for both countries, and for a larger group of countries. And hes fundamentally extremely optimistic in his approach. So just as he believes that the nation needs healing, i think he thinks the planet needs healing, and particularly that the Democratic Community has got to come together in a stronger way to address the many challenges that we have. So, i think he will start from that optimistic place. He will do a lot of listening. But i also think the democratic allies need to be ready, that he will be quite demanding because he will not want to address these big challenges that we have alone and he will want the help our allies in partners in asia, europe, and in other parts of the world. So, i think it will be a much more multilateral approach, but i dont think that hell be a pushover with allies either. Tom, can i just pick up on something that both tammy and tory just talked about, which i think is really, really important, but i want to put a slightly different gloss on it, which is, you know, tory was just talking about, you know, rebuilding sort of multilateral approaches, and tammy was talking about the tendency of some of our partners and allies to engage in selfhelp. I agree with both of those observations, but i think it is important to remember that this is bigger than trump and biden. Because for a lot of allies, they look back at the last 12 years, including the obama years, and see a pattern of reentrenchment, and diminished, in their view, u. S. Leadership. They look at the vacuum created by obamas arguably underreaction to what happened in syria, and they wonder if this is not just a transient phenomenon that trump represented, but something rather longer lasting. And so the challenge, i think, biden is going to face, as he attempts to address these issues that tammy and tory were talking about, is how credibly can he say, look, im not barack obama. Im not just the second incarnation of barack obama. Im just biden and im bringing a different approach and its one in which america is going to be more active than youve seen it be, not just in the last four years but in the last 12 years. And i think thats going to be really his challenge. Eric, thats a great point. I have long thought the key analytical question about it Biden Administration is not how is he different from trump but how he is different from obama, getting a leverage on what it might be like, tomorrow, could you come in next on that. We discussed this before, of course, but the way i try to think about it is, are there Key Assumptions or orthodoxies from the Obama Administration that are sort of different this time, you know, and i guess, you know, you could address that in the context of the middle east or more broadly, on other issues, but, you know, what do you think those most likely i guess maybe not shifts, but debates, what are the debates within the broader sort of Foreign Policy Community Around biden, about whether or not there should be a significant departure, either along the lines of what eric was suggesting or Something Else . Yeah. Thanks, tom. And this is already such a rich conversation, im really enjoying it. I think that, yes, i think that what youve already heard from this panel about the president elects proclivities is it would suggest that he sees politics possible, that he doesnt go in with these lofty overarching visions the way obama did. You know, remember obamas speech, which feels like a century ago, on eliminating nuclear weapons, for example. I think obama had, partly because of his own personal story, but partly because of the way he approached the world, he thought that he could sketch out these ambitious visions and inspire others to move forward. I think president elect biden is going to take a much more down to earth approach. Here are the problems were facing together. How do we Work Together to make this better than it is . You know, and i think the question that eric posed of can he really take that down to earth approach while simultaneously sending the message that were back, were engaged, were driving again, at a moment when, look, the United States, like every other country in the world, is facing a tremendous domestic crisis because of covid. And thats layered on top of all of the drivers of this desire to pull back from the world that exists in our domestic politics and that affected both obama and trump. If he wants to be engaged abroad, hes pushing into a domestic political headwind, and i think that, you know, i think the challenge begins at home with persuading americans that it is necessary to remain engaged, and that actually, as tory said, that we can get more done more expectedly at lower costs and perhaps lower risks working with partners. Now, you know, where do we see the relative bipartisan agreement . On which International Issues can we could a Biden Administration start out with Common Ground with republicans in the senate, for example . China, clearly you know, you can look back at the clear unified message from Congressional Democrats and Congressional Republicans and the Trump Administration, at last years Munich Security Conference on china, for example. Just across the board. You know, you can see it on russia. A desire to impose stronger consequences on the russians, and try to constrain their behavior in europe and elsewhere. And you can see it also on saudi arabia. Lets remember, you know, obama had his veto legislation from Bipartisan Legislation overridden by congress at the end of the administration, allowing 9 11 families to pursue remedies in american courts against saudi arabia. And we saw votes in congress to suspend arms sales to saudi arabia because of the yemen war that trump had to veto. So if you look at those three areas, i think all of those are areas where, if thats where you start, it pushes the United States in a more confrontational direction toward these three actors, and, you know, doing that effectively is going to require international coalition. But there is also the question of, is that where a Biden Administration wants to start . Rather than focusing on strengthening democracies, working on climate change, addressing the challenges of nuclear proliferation, you know, addressing the Global Health challenge. You know, these are things that are going to require cooperation, including from russia and china. So i do think there is an inherent tension between the domestic equation, if you will, and the international equation thats going to be difficult to solve. I actually see it the opposite way, tom. If i might. I think if you look at the Foreign Affairs article that biden penned a year ago, and, you know, the few times during the campaign that there have been conversations about National Security and Foreign Policy, because it really didnt figure too much, there is a strong stream of thought, that strong at home also requires being strong abroad, and that the two challenges, rebuilding in the United States, and Building Back better, have to work in tandem with restoring u. S. Leadership abroad, and the degree to which we can make an infrastructure leap, an innovation leap, a defense leap, and use stimulus money to make ourselves stronger, will make us both a better leader globally, in terms of how we deal with economic recovery, how we deal with pandemic, but will also put us in a stronger position to lead other allied countries in a unified approach to russia, to china, will ensure that neither of those countries gets a rout on us in terms of next generation, economy, et cetera. And then the question becomes, and you see this in the writings of some of bidens key advisers, how do you convince american kitchen tables that the two issues are linked . That so many of the jobs that they depend on in the heartland are linked to open trade and open borders, not necessarily new trade agreements, but maintaining the freedom of navigation and freedom of markets and not tariffing your friends and all of those kinds of things . But also how do you ensure that some of the stimulus money thats going into the United States and that europe is applying, is also bringing us better standing in the world, better outcomes, more green innovative ways of running our countries, such that were stronger visavis adversaries and not seeding the field to them for the next generations economy, security and infrastructure. I think they see it as linked. Its a tall order to implement that way because youre going to have to get some this is where Congress Comes in. Is a Republican Congress going to support the kind of investment that binden has talked about, 80 billion, and are they going to see it as a gift to him or are they going to see it as part of strengthening the country for everybody . And strengthening our leadership role . Thats the challenge, i think. Thanks, tory. If i could bring evan back in on precisely that point, im starting to read in some questions from the audience as well, because they are streaming in. A reporter from the Philadelphia Inquirer has a question about how biden would handle china policy. Can also add another china question two it as well, which is, the point tory is making there, you know, getting the domestic agenda through and even getting some of the nominations through will be difficult with a Republicancontrolled Senate. One way to do it is to make competition with china more central to the overall Foreign Policy narrative, right . That you need to have these Infrastructure Investments to compete with china, and that the necessary changes on the technology side, that maybe some of the nominees will sail through more if they are seen as having a liberal sort of version of great power and competition. There seems to be an active debate both in bidens world and in democratic circles on the wisdom of that. Some people embrace it, some people resist it. Whats your sense, i guess, of, a, the substance of it, having such experience on china. Having written a book on it. But also, on the internal policy within bidens world on the china issue . In some ways this is the issue that ties together so many of the themes weve been talking about, all of us today, because, you can take just as an example, china is one of the areas in which you see not a departure so much from the obama approach but an evolution. Often in some cases by some of the same practitioners, and this is partly because of a recognition of the facts on the ground. That things have changed both in the relationship, both in chinese leadership, and also in americas view at the elite level and at the popular level. And, look, i think if you take if you look back at what biden wrote, and also if you look at what some of his key advisers have been writing in Foreign Affairs and elsewhere, you begin to get a feel for the ways in which there is a recognition that the fundamental organizing principle of the u. S. China relationship under the Obama Administration, is no longer operative in the same way. Its not simply cooperation will lead to a more cooperative china. That it is now a recognition that we are into a phase of some degree, obviously, a much more contested arrangement. Now i will say a couple of things specifically. On the u. S. Political side, take, for example, just as a data point, you had a Senate Resolution to censor beijing over its involvement in hong kong that passed 1000. Nothing else in the United States these days could pass 1000. That creates from the incoming administrations side a tremendous reservoir of options. They are able to point they can say, beijing, look, this is what were contending with here. It is now in our hand, on our schedule, on our terms, to define what were going to do, because we have this mandate to do what we want to do, and thats not to say that they are going to either chuck out entirely the Trump Administration approach, or simply apply it and extend it. I think what youre likely to see, and these are very experienced practitioners who will be involved in this relationship, they will use the elements of the existing setting of the table in ways that are helpful for them. They dont need to rollback tariffs until something is provided in return. They dont need to simply change course from the existing approach on technology until they see evidence of progress. And so, even though there may be, and there are, very deep philosophical disagreements about the approach that the Trump Administration took, and how the incoming Biden Administration will take it, they are also in the unfortunate in the fortunate position of being able to inherit the elements that they find useful, and use them as leverage as necessary. So, ill sort of leave it there by the way, this is a thrilling chat with colleagues here and i feel like we could do this every week for the next week and not even fulfill all of our mandate here. I feel exactly the same way. Eric, so, one other area for this issue of leverage comes up around the jcpoa. I think you are sketching out potential differences between a Democratic Administration of whatever president and the Republican Senate, the jcpoa is probably pretty high up there on the list of areas that differ. Could you speak a little bit about how you think a Biden Administration should conceive of this issue, particularly in regard to all the leverage that this Trump Administration has bequeathed to them, and is there a way to do this that sort of, you know, builds a bridge to the senate, and a way to do it maybe that burns that bridge . Its a great question, tom. First, i just want to say i agree with every single word that evan just said. Including and and the. He sketched out brilliantly how the biden folks will be looking at the china question. And this goes more broadly, i think, into defense policy because of the National Security strategy that the trump people adopted, which prioritizes competition with russia and china, and, you know, before the election, the House Armed Services Committee Chairman adam smith said that there was going to be a big fight among democrats about the defense budget, and biden needed to do a new National Defense strategy, and all of that. I think they will, of course, do a new National Defense strategy, but i dont think its going to end up quite where adam smith thought, because of the election returns, and for all the reasons that evan just deduced, which, there is a broad bipartisan consensus that were in a long term competition strategically with china and with russia. And that probably china is the longer term bigger challenge. So i think there is broad acceptance of that and i think the Biden Administration can make its own adjustments and build on that. And biden, i think, signaled that in his stars and stripes interview where he said he didnt think there would be big cuts in the defense budget, notwithstanding the sanders amendment that calls for a 10 across the board defense cut. I think he was signaling all of this. On iran in particular, you know, the Vice President said that he wanted to go right back into the iran nuclear deal, and i hope he doesnt because i think that would be a huge mistake strategically, and it really speaks to the point that tammy made earlier about and i went through five different president ial transitions during my 30year career, and one thing that occurs all the time is the challenge, because people always come back from having been in office previously four or eight years ago, and what people discover is that the world has changed, and sometimes it takes them shorter and sometimes it takes them longer to figure that out, and i hope that the biden team will discover that on iran, its changed, and it doesnt take them longer but shorter. Because they have been bequeathed again, as evan was suggesting with china, enormous leverage because of the impact that almost nobody predicted, including the critics of the Trump Administration, that the maximum Pressure Campaign would build as much economic pressure on iran as it has. And the iranian economy is in terrible shape. Moreover, the iranians now are very much out of compliance with the standards set in the jcpoa. And so, to go back in and relieve the sanctions pressure without getting some pretty considerable in return, would be, i think, to squander the leverages they have. Moreover, it would poison the relationship with Senate Republicans who would be looking at this very carefully, and not just republicans. Lets not forget that at the time the jcpoa was agreed i was going to say signed, but then i remembered it was never actually signed because it was never actually a signed agreement, its just an accord, but the senate when it was debating it never voted on it because the Obama Administration refused to have a vote because they knew they would lose. The Senate Minority leader, who hopes to be the Senate Majority leader, Chuck Schumer, came out against the agreement. The ranking democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee bob menendez came out against the agreement. The next Ranking Member on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee came out against the agreement. So there will be bipartisan folks looking at this to see how much the biden folks are both using the leverage they have got, but also addressing what even the democratic platform admits were omissions in the agreement to begin with, which is the Ballistic Missile program and irans maligned behavior. So i think the way forward for the Biden Administration on this is first to consult with allies, and try and develop a common approach to getting iran to the table, to get a better agreement, that doesnt allow republicans to pick at all the weaknesses of the early agreement, including things like the conventional arms embargo on iran that expired on october 18. While all the rest of this stuff was going on and nobody was noticing. And that, i think, will be the best way forward. If they just rush back in and say were going back into the agreement, we dont really care about all the rest of this, i think that it would be both a diplomatic mistake but i think it will also in venom will also envenom relations in congress. I would love to get your thoughts on erics comments, but also, you know, its hard to think of another region in the world where maybe joe bidens election will be greeted so cooley, than maybe in the middle east. These guys generally were totally in bed with trump and pretty supportive of him for a wide variety of reasons. So, you know, on the iran piece for sure, but also on the brady middle east challenge that a Biden Administration will face, this isnt necessarily an area where you want to reassure, reassure, reassure, you know, there are legitimate substantive differences and beefs with several of these leaders including, of course, the crown prince of saudi arabia. So you do you think about the choices that a Biden Administration will face in the first six months, including on the jcpoa . Yeah. Im doubtful, eric, that a Biden Administration is going to rush back into a jcpoa that iran is out of compliance with. I dont actually think thats realistic. I think more likely is the question of whether you can tee up essentially a freeze for freeze, where the iranians stop their, especially the enrichment activity that has brought them out of compliance with stockpiling of nuclear material, and, you know Elliott Abrams is right now in the region consulting with allies about scaling up the iran sanctions, which, in a way, puts the Biden Administration in a good position, although i think abrams intent is to tie a binden administrations hands, but it does give them more leverage, at least in the short term i think with the iranians, to demand a sort of freeze for freeze. And that gives you time to consult with allies, to sketch out the parameters of what a bigger, longer, stronger, jcpoa 2. 0 might look like. So, you know, thats the direction i expect that they will take. But i think that, as far as the region is concerned, israel aside, the primary concern with iran has not been the nuclear proliferation. It has been the other activities. And what weve seen over the course of this maximum pressure with no offramp is that iran has escalated those activities, and the Trump Administrations incoherence in responding to that, alternating between bluster and aggression, and, you know, truly leaving allies in the lurch, it is leaving these allies with a lot of questions about the direction of american policy. And so i do think this is going to be it is both a challenge and an opportunity for the United States, but its going to come up very quickly in a lot of places. This is the issue that is going to bring riyadh and abu dhabi and everybody else knocking on the door, just as it was when the Trump Administration came in, by the way. One of the reasons that they went allin for trump is because they felt fairly or unfairly betrayed and abandoned by an Obama Administration that conducted secret diplomacy without telling them with the iranians, and made noises about leaving the saudis and iranians to work out their own. So, how does biden, you know, how does biden put those pieces together . Pursue some kind of diplomatic engagement with iran without creating the perception that, i think, would be incorrect but is quite likely among these hypersensitive regional partners, that biden is just being the antitrump and switching sides, back to the iranians . And of course, there are plenty of republican critics in the United States who would jump on that as well. So, you know, i think it would be to his advantage to find a way to kick the nuclear can down the road a little bit, and adjust the allies immediate concerns, and our immediate concerns, about Nuclear Activity in iraq, about the ability to defend against missile attacks and rocket attacks from the iranians and from their houti allies and hezbollah. And you know, to have some really tough and honest conversations with regional partners about the ways in which their behavior over the last four years has gone, not just beyond the bounds of partnership, but beyond the bounds of basic international norms. The violations of sovereignty of other countries, including the United States by the saudis, for example. Not only the murder of jamal khashoggi, but the planting of spies inside twitter, the abuse of diplomatic facilities, using saudi diplomatic facilities to help saudis in the u. S. Who were accused of common crimes to escape justice, this is not how friends behave. There needs to be some very, very honest conversations about the things we need to do together and the things that they need to pull back on in order to demonstrate that theyre committed to this partnership. Thank you. Victoria, theres a question here from jennifer rubin, which is, how can president elect biden rebuild morale in Institutional Knowledge at the state department . I would like you to adjust that, but i would like you to make a link to what tamara and eric were just saying about leverage, because we often hear that the Biden Administration ought to use this leverage and that has been bequeathed to it. I am wondering if you could talk a little bit about how it might generate leverage, and if theres anything that we have all learned from the Trump Administration in terms of, there were occasions where they did generate leverage even though people did not necessarily think it would work, and they didnt have a strategy necessarily to execute on it, or to negotiate on it, but were there things maybe that the Obama Administration could have done more of to generate leverage . What is sort of your thinking on how a Biden Administration might be able to create leverage of its own that it can use, you know, over the subsequent four years . And i just mean that in terms of, we often hear about reinvigorating diplomacy, diplomacy is personnel, it is resources, it is the buildings. It is also strategy, and youve got a lot of experience negotiating with some pretty tough characters. How do you think about sort of revitalizing diplomacy across the spectrum of all of those areas . Well, first of all, you know, i, and i think a lot of people, subscribe to the adage that diplomacy doesnt work unless its backed by strength. And that means, as we were talking about before, being increasingly strong at home, recovering fast, but also rebuilding this Alliance Structure so that regardless of the adversary, whether its china or russia or iran, or any force around the world that wants to undercut the liberal world order run by the democratic world, we have to rally together, and thats the greatest leverage when were working in tandem with others. You know, i was fascinated listening to eric and tammy. I think the middle east is going to be the most complicated for the Biden Administration, because i dont think we have an articulation yet of the middle east end state that wed like to see, right . How much does it matter to the United States that syria is still bleeding, that libya is bleeding, that yemen is a mess, that the gulfies cant Work Together, that israel is aligning with some, but were not solving, as tammy made clear, the strategic threats to israel from hezbollah, et cetera . So, i think the question becomes, can you articulate a vision of investment in the middle east, whether its with regard to syria, iraq, libya, yemen, you know, that is perhaps not the lofty 2011, you know, freedom spring vision, but is nonetheless a consistent investment on the side of stability, on the side of rolling back maligned behavior, whether its iran, whether its russia, whether its saudis, whether its our ally turkey, and bringing major allies to the table around that vision. And as eric and tammy have said, jcpoa, unlike the climate accord, is not turnkey. You cant just flip it back on because the conditions are no longer being met. So how do you define this bigger, i would say, at the same time that you dont want to see iran going back to Building Nuclear weapons . The maligned behavior with the support of other malign actors around the world is more dangerous right now. And how do you build on that . The other thing is with the jcpoa, remember that russia and china were partners. Hard to imagine that we are going to be able to do that with them. So again, i think this takes you back to the question of leverage, tom, which is that, you know, with europe, with our asian allies, starting with a core of g7 nations, who are the biggest democracies around the world, how do you Work Together both to rebuild ourselves, because you have to start from that place, remember the long telegram speaks about you cant defeat the soviet union if you are not strong at home, which reagan also took up with a vengeance in 1980 and i think will be persuasive to Congressional Republicans if it is articulated right but how do you convince everybody to make a contribution in common . And frankly, i dont see another country that can organize this joint liberal approach to china, to russia, to technology, to iran, to climate, other than us. So we are going to have to first articulate a clear vision. We are going to have a team that can implement it. One of the main problems is they were not doing any diplomacy, they were not conducting any. Pompeo did a little bit, but a state department that is eric taught me, has 10 major policy leaders from the secretary, deputy secretary, undersecretary for political affairs, and even some ambassadors, who are out engaging in negotiations and who are supported by young diplomatic teams who are learning how its done, who are working with the evans of this world to explain policy to the fourth estate, who are in dialogue with the congress, and who will bring in resources to the table, whether they are security resources, whether they are development resources, whether they are, you know, the punitive resources of a shared sanctions approach, et cetera. So, you know, we have not been out there in the world. The table has been empty. And the malign actors, whoever they are, have rushed in to fill the gap, and theyve had it easy. But also, our allies have had it easy because we havent been asking them to join with us in some of these things. And some of them may be very difficult, including things like if we decide that we need to have an export control regime together against chinese high technology, which i think is a bipartisan move that people will support. Will the europeans support that . Will asian allies support that . So, theres a lot of work to do, but i think it will be exciting for the state department to get back into the business of trying to talk to allies and friends, and adversaries, about all this work that needs to be done. Tom, can i just pick up on some of what victoria said . Because i did not disagree with what she said, but i think it is very hard to underestimate how much damage has been done to the diplomatic platform of the United States by the Trump Administration. And its not just the Trump Administration. There were a number of trends that go back way before that, that have contributed to this, but the hemorrhage of senior officers, victoria being a typical example my age cohort, i am 69, we age doubts. And so thats not important that i am 69, we aged out. And so thats not important that people of my age group left. But the american taxpayer has invested enormous amounts of money getting people ready to send the most senior positions and they are not there now. Just a giant void. You cant make that up by just saying we will promote the 40 and 45yearolds because this because this is a business where experience and Long Development of subject matter, expertise, and familiarity actually means a lot. It matters dramatically. So i think the state department is going to require really a kind of 10 to 15 year rebuild. I mean, when tori and i entered the Foreign Service, there were roughly 22,000 people a year taking the Foreign Service exam. Last year it was 7000. And so, theres going to have to be a lot of work done and a lot of effort, i think, probably we havent the last on the Foreign Service got looked at by the legislative branch was in 1980 with the Foreign Service act of 1980. Its probably time to review that and had a new Foreign Service act. There are new core competency ies that are going to be required. That this is not good because of how badly the institution was burned down to actually reimagine it and rebuild it in a way that serves the u. S. National interest. But i think no one should underestimate the length of time for the amount of effort it is going to take. Thank you, eric. Very important issue. I know everyone has views on this, but we have 10 minutes left so i want to turn quickly to several questions on the transition. John at the Minneapolis Star Tribune asks how diplomatically damaging is president trumps refusal to concede, to continue contesting the election, the Election Results . Theres another question from deirdre of usa today about which foreign leaders will president elect biden speak to in the coming days, and what of are those conversations likely to be about . I guess the overarching question is really a fairly precedented situation of what is it, 78 day transition with an outgoing president that seems sort of determined to if that quite burn everything to the ground, maybe to certainly push back, not to cooperate in the transfer of power, and to sort of build up his position in the future. Evan, could you just talk to us about the dangers of whats going on at the moment . How rocky are the next couple of months might be, somehow the biden team might respond . But more importantly, really is there any long term damage that could be done over the next 2. 5 months that will not be easily repaired, not so much in the policy side but rather on the institutions of government and the health of american democracy . Yeah, i think its impossible to overstate how damaging it is to the short, medium, and long range interests of the United States to have a president who appears to be fundamentally rejecting the legitimacy of our political system. And its damaging to the interests of the Republican Party as a Foreign Policy actor. Its damaging to the interests of the american public, and of course, it makes it challenging for the Biden Administration thats coming in. And i think what you have seen is the Biden Administration, the Biden Campaign knew exactly what donald trump was going to do. This was not a mystery. Its one of those with weird things that is both shocking and unsurprising. And their approach has now been quite consistent over the last few days and i think youll see it continue, which is they will not allow themselves to be drawn in to the invention of a dispute. There is no dispute here. The law is clear. The votes are being counted and the count is clear, and the only confusion here, frankly, is in the mind of donald j. Trump and on the part of the leaders around him who are deciding in realtime weather not to acknowledge reality or to make the political calculation to stay in his particular form of delusion. And i have to be honest, i am being blunt about this because those are the stakes here. And i think the way to think of it is that the Biden Campaign is practicing what i would call vigilant reassurance. They are letting the world know that they are not participating in the fiction, that there is an actual dispute, but they are also using the courts as absolutely aggressively as they need to be. But they dont have any question here. On january 20, president trumps signature becomes legally an and the next president will take office, full stop. Yeah, so let me come in on that. I do think, you know, the lost time for a Transition Team in giving cooperation from the Current Administration matters. Although that is not unprecedented. Onh v. Gore was decided december 12 and there was an orderly transition between then and january 20. So it is doable, but it seems that so far the Trump Administration has instructed agencies not to cooperate with the incoming team, so the transition landing teams cannot start their work, the transition can prepare personnel choices, but it is going to have a lot of trouble getting those people into the nomination process if the Republican Senate is not willing to go along with the transition. So the lost time does matter. But i actually i think that there are couple other things that worry me more in this transition period. One is that it is always a point of transition planning to be concerned about which International Actors might try to take advantage of the transition period to test the United States, or to undertake activities where they might otherwise face challenges on the u. S. And given trumps capriciousness, irrationality, the policy process, thats another dangerous prospect for the United States in this transition than in any previous one. We just dont know how he would react to, for example, another major Iraqi Militia attack on american troops or the American Embassy in iraq. Just to take one example. So, we have to worry about that. The other thing that worries me very much is, what will be left behind and what will be destroyed . We have plenty of evidence now of the corruption of the Trump Administration and its willingness to use Foreign Policy and International Relationship for private purposes and private gain. Whether we are talking about the issue that was litigated in the impeachment of the president , or the simple use of the state department in dinners for mike pompeo and his wife to prepare the political ground for his possible electoral future. That kind of corruption is corrosive. So even though you remove the elected and appointed officials of the Trump Administration, you have lawyers and lawyers of people in the state department and in every agency across the federal government who have been coerced into these acts of corruption, they have simply been complicit, or in an attempt to defend their agency from worse degradation, went along with them because they had to pick their battles. All of the recrimination and the corrosion of that experience is left behind for the Biden Administration to confront, and that will impede our ability to do our work. So, i think thats a tremendous challenge that we cant lose sight of. Thank you. Did anyone want to come in on that before i move on . Point first of all, i agree with everything evan and tammy just said. I do want to make one point, which is, look, if emily murphy designates president biden, or president elect biden as president elect on december 14 when the electors are certified, as tammy said, that wont be any er than the bush v. Gore. Yeah. But i have to say, and i think from my conversations, the biden transition folks have been anticipating an uncooperative transition from the outset, as evan suggested. Having said that, you know, to the point that tammy made earlier that when people get in, they need to take an assessment of the state of the agencies as they are, and prepare for taking the reins of government on january 21. And our system is not like the british system where you have the election and then the new Prime Minister walks in at number 10 and gets handed his red box with all the memos from the permanent cabinet secretary who continues in office and everything just takes over. If you want to watch the transition of power, you can go to the southwest gate, or at least that you can get to it nowadays, and watch the 18 pulling out of the white house with the records of all the Previous Administration and new administration is coming into the white house and theres nothing there except maybe a couple of secretaries and phones that might or might not work. So, the problem is that, as one of my former Foreign Service mentors told me long ago, transition time is equal to three times governing time. Because when you walk in there on january 21, you are literally drinking from the fire hose. Theres everything from around the world pouring in at you and demanding attention and a response. The ability to try and think through these problems that youre going to inherit calmly and without being forced to take immediate action on them is a luxury that we have in our system that we are squandering. And its going to complicate everything, and its one reason why its such a disgrace that more republicans have not spoken out, as mitt romney has, and a few others, to call an end to this charade. Thank you, eric. Were out of time, so i would like to give tori the last word, maybe on the transition point or on anything else that you would like to add before we close. You know, i agree with all that has been said. I think this team would be supremely prepared. I think the bigger problem, and its not just trump intransigence. Its also covid, which makes it hard to gather and speak informally and get the wisdom of the longserving professional staff in all of these agencies. It will be harder, but i am an optimist. I think joe biden is an optimist. I think the world is ready for a more orderly and stable and predictable and committed United States. So, i look forward to it. Tori, evan, eric, tamara, thank you so much. Thank you all, for all of you online joining us via zoom and via the website. I think with a very large group of people, so thank you so much and thank you for the questions. And i can say with great confidence that this is an issue we will come back to, maybe not every day or every other day, but probably every week for now for some time to come. So thank you again. And until next time, we are adjourned. Use your mobile devices, laptop, or phone come and go to cspan. Org election for access to Election Results, the balance of power in congress, our latest video live and ondemand for the transition of power, go to on thursday, nancy pelosi and Chuck Schumer hold a briefing at 10 15 a. M. On cspan. At 11 00 a News Conference with kevin mccarthy. Realist society jose discussion on the rule of law and per the presidency. At 11 00 a. M. , the Senate Returns to work on a judicial nomination for southern florida. Hour, up in an