WASHINGTON — WASHINGTON (AP) – Donald Trump he doesn’t think much Joe Biden’s foreign policy record. The Republican president-elect often casts the outgoing Democratic president as a bad leader who crushed American credibility in the world during his four years in office.
But a funny thing happened when Trump returned to the White House: The Biden and Trump national security teams have come to understand that they have no choice but to work together as a conflict. Gaza, Syria and Ukraine A significant part of the world has been left on a knife’s edge.
It is unclear how much commonality these groups have found as they navigate crises that threaten to spark further global unrest as Trump prepares to return to the White House on January 20, 2025.
“There’s a deep conviction from the incoming national security team that we’re dealing with … and on our part, led by President Biden, that it’s our job, on behalf of the American people, to make sure this is a smooth transition,” Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan said at a forum in California over the weekend. in the appearance “And we are committed to fulfilling that duty as ruthlessly and faithfully as possible.”
Certainly, Trump and his allies have not stopped criticizing Biden, placing the blame on the shoulders of Biden and the Democrats for a series of crises around the world.
The president-elect says that Biden is responsible for the wars in Gaza and Ukraine, arguing that his policies emboldened Hamas and Russia. And a little before that of Syria Bashar al-Assad’s government fell last week, Trump blamed Biden’s old boss, former President Barack Obama not complying with his “red line”. In 2013, Assad killed hundreds of civilians after deploying chemical weapons and laying the groundwork for Islamic militants to establish a beachhead in the country.
But amid the Biden shake-up, Trump team officials acknowledge that the Biden White House has worked diligently to keep Trump’s circle in the loop and help ensure a smooth transition on national security matters.
“For those of our adversaries out there who think it’s opportunity time, that they can play one administration with another, they’re wrong, and we’re the gloves,” Mike Waltz, Trump’s pick for national security adviser. “We are one team with the United States in this transition,” he said in an interview on Fox News last month.
While Trump rarely has good words for the Democratic administration, the Trump world appreciates the fact that Biden has shared critical national security information with the White House, according to a Trump transition official who was not authorized to comment publicly.
Coordination is precisely how lawmakers intended the incoming and outgoing administrations to behave during a transition when they strengthened federal assistance for transitions. It is already the most important transition process since 2009, according to Biden and Trump aides, surpassing Trump’s chaotic first takeover in 2017 and the broad refusal to cooperate with the incoming Biden team in 2021.
Trump’s choice Serving as Special Envoy to the Middle EastFlorida real estate developer Steve Witkoff, consulted with Biden administration officials as he recently went to the Middle East to meet with the Prime Minister of Israel Benjamin Netanyahu and Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, according to a US official who was not authorized to comment publicly on the sensitive talks and spoke on condition of anonymity.
Sullivan, who was scheduled to travel to Israel for talks with Netanyahu on Wednesday, has kept Waltz apprised of the Biden administration’s efforts to reach a cease-fire and hostage deal in Gaza before Trump took office.
Biden administration officials have said the two national security teams have also coordinated closely in Ukraine and Syria, though they have provided scant details about what that coordination has looked like.
“Let me put it this way: Nothing we’re doing and nothing we’re saying will come as a surprise to the incoming team,” White House national security spokesman John Kirby said. “They will decide what policy they want to keep, what approach they want to follow and which ones they don’t.”
Trump made it clear during his campaign that he would move to quickly end the war in Ukraine once in office. He asked Russian leader Vladimir Putin to act this week Get an immediate ceasefire with Ukraine.
But the Biden White House has begun to slowly — and publicly — outline how continued support for Ukraine aligns with Trump’s priorities.
On Saturday, Sullivan pointed to Trump’s comments on social media to point out that Biden’s push to contain Ukraine is in line with the incoming president’s thinking.
Trump said later that day that Assad’s rule was collapsing because Russia had “lost all interest in Syria for Ukraine, where some 600,000 Russian soldiers were wounded or dead in a war that should never have started, and could have gone on forever.”
“Russia and Iran are in a weakened state right now, one because of Ukraine and the bad economy, the other because of Israel and its combat success,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.
Sullivan emphasized that Biden and Trump agree that there are no American boots on the ground in Syria and that the war in Ukraine was a major factor in Assad’s downfall.
“It surprised me a little bit — at the beginning of the post, part of the reason this is happening is because of Russia’s war on Ukraine,” Sullivan said of Trump. “And I think that Russia also referred to the size of the victims in Ukraine, and because of that, they are not in a position to defend their client, Assad. And on that point, we have a strong consensus.”
Two days later in Washington, Sullivan said Trump should strengthen the little-known US International Development Finance Corporation, which was created during the Republican’s first term.
The push to reauthorize the foreign aid agency comes as Trump promises to make major cuts to the federal bureaucracy.
Trump signed into law the agency’s authority — included in a five-year reauthorization of the Federal Aviation Administration — to provide $60 billion in loans, loan guarantees and insurance to companies in developing countries.
Sullivan called the agency an effective tool for private-public cooperation, before accepting the case that “maybe I shouldn’t be there” since “I’m leaving, but I’ll still give my advice.”
“It came about, as we’ve all pointed out, under the Trump administration,” Sullivan said in remarks at the agency’s annual conference. “It has strengthened in the Biden administration. And with DFC reauthorization next year, it must remain a bipartisan priority.”
After the fall of Assad’s government, the Biden administration warned Iran not to accelerate its nuclear program after one of its closest allies suspended it, saying “that will never happen on our watch.” The US official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive issue, suggested coordination on the issue with the Trump team.
The official said there had been “good discussions” on the matter with the incoming administration and there was hope that the policy would continue.
Biden has also approved a new national security memorandum that will serve as a roadmap for the incoming Trump administration in hopes of dealing with it. increasing cooperation Among China, Iran, North Korea and Russia, the White House announced on Wednesday.
Biden administration officials began developing the guidelines this summer. It was designed to be a document that will help the next administration build its approach from Day 1 on how to deal with strained relations between the United States’ most prominent rivals and competitors, according to two other senior administration officials.
One of those officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity in line with ground rules set by the White House, sought to reassure the Trump team that the White House’s effort is “not trying to get them in or sway them to one policy option or another.” .
Instead, the official said, it’s about helping the next administration build “capacity” as it adjusts its policies to the more difficult foreign policies it will face.
