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Trump And The World

In The News

Indicted, Again! Another Opportunity For Trump To Play The Martyr Card

The third indictment against Donald Trump raises the legal dispute between the United States and its former president to a new level. While Trump cries foul play, drawing shameful comparisons with Nazi persecution 1930s Germany, the consequences of the trial can't be predicted.

-Analysis-

Fifteen months. That's how much time is left for Jack Smith, special investigator of the U.S. Department of Justice, if he wants to conclude the "swift trial" against Donald Trump before the next U.S. election. On Nov. 5, 2024, Trump wants to become the U.S. President again, assuming he emerges victorious.

With the latest indictment against him, it is clear that the road to that date will pose unprecedented challenges to U.S. democracy and its institutions.

Trump has been charged with four counts in a U.S. federal court in Washington: conspiracy to defraud the United States, obstruction of an official proceeding (Joe Biden's election), and general conspiracy against the law, among others.

The indictment, which will be heard for the first time this Thursday, brings a new level of complexity to the legal dispute between the U.S. and its former president. The indictments admitted so far have been far less spectacular: one of them is also being negotiated at the federal level, but deals exclusively with Trump's handling of classified documents. A criminal case at the New York state level is primarily directed against the "Trump Organization" company. In addition, Trump faces another indictment at the state level for alleged election fraud in Georgia. The 77-year-old repeatedly claimed his innocence in all cases.

In addition to the complex legal level, there is also the political level, which is becoming increasingly important. Trump and his campaign team are using the legal disputes to circulate conspiracy stories of the so-called Deep State against him. A spokesman for the team responded to the latest indictment by comparing the U.S. judiciary to Hitler's Germany. The lawless manner in which the ex-president and his supporters are being prosecuted is "reminiscent of 1930s Nazi Germany, the former Soviet Union and other authoritarian, dictatorial regimes," the statement said.

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Washington, Rome, Kampala: The Sacred Counting Of Democracy

At 6 p.m. local time Wednesday in Rome, while much of the world was transfixed on Washington, D.C., Italian reporters were huddled in a vast room of the nation's Parliament to witness another political crisis unfolding.

Former Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi announced that his minor party would pull out of the government, plunging Italian politics into deep uncertainty that may only be resolved with a new snap election. Pundits accused Renzi of acting for his cynical personal interest, trying to force out Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte to make space for his own comeback to the center of the political stage. Others noted that the announcement baffled Italians, who had just heard the news that their country had recorded 507 new COVID-19 deaths that day, pushing the toll past 80,000. Some argued that the far-right would win if the country heads to the polls.

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What Trump's Twitter Ban Means For The Rest Of The World

By closing Donald Trump's social media accounts, the Big Tech platforms have recognized for the first time their fundamental responsibility for the content they broadcast. But for this and other reasons that now also means the regulators must step up.

-OpEd-

PARIS — Do we have the right to silence a man for taking extreme positions, particularly if we are a private company? And what if the individual in question is the democratically elected head of state? These philosophical questions have suddenly become urgent with Twitter's decision to ban the account of the American president, Donald Trump, after the whole world watched in dismay as his supporters invaded the Capitol.

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On 'The Trump Question' - The Burden For Biden's Presidency

The assault on the Capitol wasn't an attempted coup, per se. But the ramifications of how to hold Trump responsible are fundamental for the future of the American democracy.

WASHINGTON — When a mob attacked the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 and stopped Congress from certifying Joe Biden as the nation's next president, it was scary – and fatal for at least five people.

But it did not pose a serious threat to the nation's democracy.

An attempt at an illegal power grab somehow keeping Donald Trump in the Oval Office was never likely to happen, let alone succeed. Trump always lacked the authority, and the mass support, required to steal an election he overwhelmingly lost. He didn't control state election officials or have enough influence over the rest of the process to achieve that goal.

Nevertheless, over his term as president, he repeatedly violated democratic norms, like brazenly promoting his own business interests, interfering in the Justice Department, rejecting congressional oversight, insulting judges, harassing the media and failing to concede his election loss.

However, as scholars who study democracy historically and comparatively, we predict that the biggest threats to democracy Trump poses won't emerge until after he exits the White House – when Biden will have to face the Trump presidency's most serious challenges.

Trump never really threatened a coup, which is a swift and irregular transfer of power from one executive to another, where force or the threat of force installs a new leader with the support of the military. Coups are the typical manner in which one dictator succeeds another.

A coup displacing a legitimately elected government is quite rare; prominent examples from the past 100 years across the world include Spain in 1923, Iran in 1953, Guatemala in 1954, Brazil in 1964, Greece in 1967, Chile in 1973, Pakistan in 1999 and Thailand in 2006.

A military-backed takeover was not going to happen in the U.S. Its armed forces are extremely unlikely to intervene in domestic politics for regime change, especially not in favor of a president who is historically unpopular among its ranks.

Even if Trump's most ardent supporters believe he won, there aren't enough of them to credibly threaten a civil war. Despite their ability to breach a thinly defended Capitol, a sustained insurrection would be easily quashed by law enforcement.

Trump couldn't even stage an "auto-coup," which happens when an elected executive declares a state of emergency and suspends the legislature and judiciary, or restricts civil liberties, to seize more power. There have also been very few of those perpetrated against democratically elected governments over the last 100 years. The most prominent examples are Hitler's Germany in 1933, Bordaberry in Uruguay (1972), Fujimori in Peru (1992), Erdoğan in Turkey (2015), Maduro in Venezuela (2017), Morales in Bolivia (2019) and Orbán in Hungary (2020).

A U.S. president can't dismiss the legislative or judicial branches, and elections are not under his control: The Constitution declares that they are run by the states. And the declaration of election results is also well outside the power of the president (or vice president). It doesn't matter whether the losing side formally concedes; the new president's term begins at noon on Jan. 20.

Taking him away? — Photo: Samantha Sophia

The attack on the Capitol may have threatened the lives of federal legislators and Capitol police officers, but the most it achieved was to interrupt, briefly, a ministerial procedure. Within hours, both the House and Senate were back in session in the Capitol, carrying on their certification of the electoral votes cast in 2020.

By objecting to the outcome of the election, Trump highlighted aspects of the process that many Americans were previously unaware of, ironically ensuring the public is better informed about the mechanics and details of American elections. In that way, he may have, paradoxically, made American democracy stronger.

And it was fairly strong already. There was no evidence of any sort of widespread fraud or other irregularities. Major media organizations continue to explain and document the facts regarding the election, contradicting the president's disinformation campaign. In 2020, voter turnout was higher than it has been for a century. Despite the pandemic, Trump's rhetoric and threats of foreign tampering, the 2020 elections were the most secure in living memory.

Perhaps one anxiety eclipsed all others: a lawless president who never faces justice.

But beyond elections, Trump has threatened America's other bedrock political institutions. While there are many seemingly disparate examples of his disregard for the Constitution, what unites them is impunity and contempt for the rule of law. He has committed numerous impeachable acts – including potentially the incitement-to-riot on Jan. 6. He is facing a criminal investigation in New York state, and may be looking at federal inquiries both about possible misdeeds he committed in office and from before he became president.

The framers of the Constitution feared many things they designed the U.S. government to defend against, but perhaps one anxiety eclipsed all others: a lawless president who never faces justice, and was never held accountable during or even after leaving office. As Alexander Hamilton wrote, "if the federal government should overpass the just bounds of its authority and make a tyrannical use of its powers, the people, whose creature it is, must appeal to the standard they have formed, and take such measures to redress the injury done to the Constitution."

There's very little time left to hold Trump to account during his term. After the events of Jan. 6, he now faces public backlash from longtime congressional allies and resignations from his Cabinet. He has also been locked out of Facebook and Twitter.

But the question of real, lasting – and legal – accountability will fall to Biden, and his nominee for attorney general, Merrick Garland. They will decide whether to continue existing investigations and potentially start new ones. State attorneys general and local prosecutors will have similar powers for the laws they enforce.

Newly elected leaders can often face strong incentives – and encouragement – to prosecute their predecessors, as Biden does now. But that approach, often called restorative justice, can also destabilize democracy's prospects if lame-duck executives anticipate this and decide to hunker down and fight instead of conceding defeat. Consider Libya's Moammar Gadhafi, toppled by Western military intervention and killed by his people in 2011. He refused to flee or seek asylum for fear that both foreign governments and his own successors would prosecute him for human rights violations.

Perhaps counterintuitively, it is when outgoing presidents in transitioning democracies enshrine protections against their prosecution directly before leaving office that the democratic system is more likely to endure. This was the case in Chile with dictator Augusto Pinochet, who left power in 1989 under the aegis of a constitution he foisted on the country on his way out.

By contrast, after-the-fact pardoning of crimes – as Gerald Ford did of Richard Nixon – runs the risk of creating a larger threat to democracy: the idea that rogue leaders and their henchmen are above the law. If Trump finds a way to pardon himself, he may reduce his legal vulnerability, but he can't erase it entirely.

If prosecutors or Congress let Trump off the hook, they may be the ones breaking new and dangerous ground, truly shattering the rule of law that underpins American democracy.

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eyes on the U.S.
John M. Murphy*

The Months That Will Turn Joe Into President Biden

For all his experience in government, Biden is entering unfamiliar territory. Trump, barking at the president-elect's heels and challenging his legitimacy, will try to make the transition harder still.

Joe Biden won the election, but whether he wins the transition is another question. The peaceful transfer of power always tests an incoming president, but this time promises to be particularly perilous.

The coronavirus pandemic is accelerating, taking lives and jobs as it spreads. The incumbent, President Donald Trump, has only reluctantly agreed to the transition and knows how to dominate the national conversation. He seems determined to deny his successor's legitimacy and appears to be planning a 2024 campaign rally on Inauguration Day.

In the transition time remaining, I believe Biden needs to establish two kinds of legitimacy. He should show the nation that he possesses the competence to plan an administration, in order to create substantive legitimacy. And he should perform important ceremonial rituals, in order to establish symbolic legitimacy.

As a scholar of the presidency, I've written about John Kennedy's transition, which culminated in his superb inaugural address. Biden seems unlikely to match that rhetorical achievement, but he is off to a solid start.

President Donald Trump speaks behind a podium.

President Donald Trump speaks during a rally to support Republican Senate candidates in Valdosta, Ga. on Dec. 5, 2020. Photo by Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP via Getty Images

This one's different

The president-elect has sought to craft his substantive legitimacy through comparison and contrast. One of these presidents, Biden suggests, is not like the other.

This is not an unusual strategy. Democratic political consultant David Axelrod long ago coined the opposites theory of presidential elections, noting, "Voters rarely seek the replica of what they have." President-elect Biden appears to assume that he won at least in part because voters rejected Donald Trump, and so he has reinforced the difference between the two during the early transition.

When the election hung in the balance, the former vice president waited for the results with the rest of us. Unlike Trump, Biden refused to declare victory, noting only that "We feel good about where we are." His humility contrasted to Trump's behavior throughout his term.

When the result became clear, Biden not only promoted national unity in his Nov. 7 speech, he also shared the stage with Vice President-elect Kamala Harris. That was a perk denied Biden on election night in 2008 and an indication that he planned to govern not as a rogue individual but as part of a team.

His first staff and cabinet choices have reinforced the teamwork theme. "Competence is making a comeback," the Associated Press declared in its analysis of Biden's national security selections. The president-elect quietly made his decisions, with no public auditions or press leaks. He introduced them as a team in a sober setting. Each gave remarks emphasizing their commitments to morality and honesty.

For example, his nominee for Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken, movingly told the Holocaust survival story of his stepfather, announcing a moral mission for the United States in the world. Avril Haines, nominated for Director of National Intelligence, said she would speak truth to power, "knowing that you would never want me to do otherwise and that you value the perspective of the intelligence community, and that you will do so even when what I have to say may be inconvenient or difficult."

Joe Biden is clearly determined to dissociate his administration from the previous one, which was characterized by neither moral commitment nor faith in truth. He is crafting his substantive legitimacy by demonstrating his belief in teamwork, morality, competence and experience. His administration, he claims with these choices, is ready to lead.

Biden and Harris appearing at an announcement event

Biden, left, and Harris, right, appear jointly at many events. Chandan Khanna/AFP via Getty Images

Symbolic legitimacy

Biden is among the most experienced candidates elected to the presidency. Yet assuming the office will be difficult, even for him. He has been a senator and vice president, but he has not been in charge.

To become the president requires ritual.

A president is both the legislative leader and the head of state, the equivalent of a British prime minister and the queen in one. The trappings of the office make the office. Americans need to see Biden invested with the presidency, much as a Prince of Wales becomes the king by assuming the robes and powers of his office in a ceremony.

The inaugural ceremony on Jan. 20 is a ritual of transition that transforms "Joe" into a head of state, into Mr. President. The inaugural address gives him the opportunity to demonstrate his presidential capacity, to unite partisans as one people, and display himself as their leader.

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The Founders understood the human need for political ceremony at times of transition. George Washington learned of his first election to the presidency on April 14, 1789 and soon left his Mount Vernon estate in Virginia for the then-capital of New York City.

Washington's journey turned into a grand celebration of the new nation. In Trenton, New Jersey, for example, 13 young women, dressed in white, walked before him, strewing flowers from baskets as he rode underneath a magnificent floral arch. Washington was no longer a gentleman farmer nor even a general. He was about to become the president and these sorts of rituals marked the way.

Biden is unlikely to undertake such a journey from Wilmington to Washington, although Axios has reported that Biden could ditch the recent inaugural tradition, "the typical flourish of arriving in Washington on an Air Force plane, pulling in instead on the same Amtrak train he rode to and from Delaware for 30 years as a senator."

A lithograph showing George Washington being greeted by

A lithograph of Washington's reception by ladies, on passing the bridge at Trenton, N.J., April 1789, on his way to New York to be inaugurated first president of the United States. Nathaniel Currier/Smithsonian American Art Museum

If Biden is to establish his symbolic legitimacy as a rightful president of the United States, he will need a ceremony displaying that legitimacy, one that looks and sounds like those of his predecessors. This will be hard in a pandemic, as the campaign showed. He was unable to campaign as a candidate normally would or give his election night speech in front of a roaring crowd, as, for example, Barack Obama did in Chicago's Grant Park in 2008.

Now, it seems unlikely that he will be able to take the oath in a large ceremony or enjoy many of the traditional trappings of a presidential inauguration. Biden has said his inauguration could "resemble the Democratic National Convention."

Although the 2020 convention was successful, it didn't look like the traditional inaugural ceremonies. As a model, it would deprive the nation of many of its comforting rituals. It would substitute a small, televised ceremony at the Capitol and virtual activities from around the nation.

The president-elect and his advisers will have to find ways to make these new traditions authorize his presidency as well as the old ones. I do not envy them this task.The Conversation

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Biden Wins: 46 World Newspaper Front Pages Of Next President

It's Joe! After the world watched for four days as the United States counted its votes, Joe Biden has clinched victory over Donald Trump in one of the most consequential presidential elections in American history. Trump's four tumultuous years in the White House are now bound to end, even if the outgoing president has vowed to contest the result and is sure to make the transition to a new administration anything but smooth.

Still the verdict from the voters has been acknowledged by world leaders, who formally congratulated Biden. Further confirming the reality, newspapers around the world splashed the news across their front pages. Here's a sampling of 46 newspapers for the incoming 46th president, from India and Italy to Austria and Argentina, as well as Biden's native city of Scranton and home state of Delaware :

USA

The Washington Post

The New York Times

Kansas City Star

New York Post

Delaware News Journal

The Sunday Times (Scranton, PA)

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Dominique Moisi

Trump And The Totalitarian Temptation

By prematurely declaring victory, while the counting of votes is still ongoing, Donald Trump is taking a leaf out of an autocrat’s playbook.

-Analysis-

PARIS — The Permanent Coup. This was the title of a controversial 1964 essay by François Mitterrand in which he denounced then President Charles de Gaulle's exercise of power in France. What words would Mitterrand choose today to describe Donald Trump"s anti-democratic practices?

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LA STAMPA
Alessio Perrone

Italy's Election, A Sign That Trump Could Pay For COVID-19

Italian populist party leader Matteo Salvini's disappointing results in regional elections is being blamed on his erratic handling of the health crisis in one of the worst-hit countries.

In what some are calling the most consequential U.S. presidential election ever, the coronavirus crisis will no doubt play a role in who voters choose. According to a recent poll by the Kaiser Family Foundation, the handling of the pandemic is the top issue for 20% of the American electorate, behind only the economy.

Donald Trump's decidedly haphazard, often anti-science response to the health crisis has included his admitting that he intentionally downplayed its severity, scoffed at the use of masks, and regularly compared COVID-19 to the common flu. And as the U.S. tops 200,000 deaths, many are wondering whether he will pay a price at the polls for his coronavirus response.

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CLARIN
Marcelo Cantelmi

Donald Trump, Accident Or Consequence Of History

The bombastic president seems to have little regard for precedence or decorum. But is he just an anomaly? And if not, what happens if he loses?

-Analysis-

BUENOS AIRES — The United States and the world should ask themselves at some point whether Donald Trump, like the disastrous George W. Bush two terms before him, is an anomaly or a direct consequence of the nation's troubled history.

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Luis Rubio

Trump, 'Terrorist' Cartels And The True Roots Of Mexico's Violence

In loudly rejecting President's Trump threat to label Mexican drug gangs terrorists, Mexico's government is covering its failure, if not reluctance, to tackle systemic corruption and its offspring, crime.

-OpEd-

MEXICO CITY — Gunfire didn't do the job, nor are the Mexican president's much-touted "hugs' working. Facing the plague of criminal violence in Mexico, nobody here seems to have a reasonable diagnosis of its nature, causes or possible solutions. And yet a single recent declaration from President Donald Trump, when he said that the drug cartels might be declared international terrorists, was enough to prompt our public officials to collectively indulge in some patriotic indignation.

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CLARIN
Felipe Frydman*

For Brazil And Argentina, How To Respond To New Trump Tariffs

President Trump's erratic strikes against the world's trading regime require a collective response, as unilateral state reprisals cannot check an 'arrogant' U.S. administration.

-Analysis-

BUENOS AIRES — The decision by President Donald Trump to reimpose tariffs on Argentine and Brazilian steel and aluminum exports, as a response to the two countries' devalued currencies is a hard blow to both.

President Trump imposed tariffs of 25% on steel and 10% on aluminum from any source in March last year. Argentina and Brazil were exempted after agreeing to limit these exports in a quota system. Now to end the exemption, the Trump administration cited national security reasons foreseen in Section 232B of the 1962 Trade Expansion Act, adding farmers are also being harmed.

This would indicate the White House's concern over China redirecting its soy purchases in response to U.S. sanctions on its exportations. The excuse of manipulating exchange rates in lieu of a subsidy is not in line with any of the Uruguay Round accords and constitutes a unilateral decision in violation of international commitments.

The Agreement on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures says there must be a specific subsidy for an exporting firm or sector to justify applying compensatory tariffs. The problems of fluctuating exchange rates furthermore concern the International Monetary Fund, which is tasked with evaluating their effects on the balance of payments. It is not the first time the United States makes such allegations.

Trump has turned trade negotiations into a boxing match.

In August this year, the Treasury Department cited Section 3003 of the 1988 Trade Act in accusing China of manipulating its currency to compensate for punitive tariffs on its exports.

That contradicted the Department's own conclusions in its report of October 2018. President Trump has turned trade negotiations into a boxing match in keeping with his presidential style of the last three years. International norms are considered disposable, and both the U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin are always predisposed to find arguments to justify the president's unpredictable reactions.

Lack of predictability in trade negotiations is an impediment to investments, and ultimately slows global growth. The United States has also decided to block the World Trade Organization's Appellate Body, which has seven members and needs a minimum of three to function.

President Trump meets with Cabinet to discuss trade tariffs. –– Photo: Tia Dufour/White House/ZUMA

The United States has blocked the nomination of new members for disagreeing with the criteria used to resolve conflicts between parties. Countries have tried separately to face Trump's nonsensical reactions to avoid exacerbating the discord, but the lack of a consensual reaction appears merely to encourage such erratic measures, rather than to appease.

Our regional trade block Mercosur should question its trade policy with the United States at its next summit. It should take a collective complaint to the WTO to make the point that arrogance is not the way to solve trade conflicts.

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