Joe Biden administration officials, disheartened after Tuesday's presidential election, are considering how to protect their national security priorities before President-elect Donald Trump re-enters the Oval Office in January. Whether it is about sending funds to Ukraine or introducing new sanctions against extremist Israeli settlers, there are a number of options on the table, Politiko writes, citing informed sources.
A senior official of the Biden administration told the portal that there is no concrete plan to protect Biden's key policies from Trump's attempts to dismantle them, while some believe that such a plan would not yield significant results.
Trump, according to a number of current and former US officials, will certainly quickly stop or reverse much of what the Biden team manages to implement during these last months. He will have broad powers to do so, as well as sufficient support in Congress and the judiciary, which will mean that almost nothing will stop him.
"There is no complete protection from Trump," said one US official. "You can only delay the impact of Trump, just throw sand in the wheels, but there is no way to completely protect something."
As Reuters points out, Trump is returning to power as the leader of the Republican Party, which has been reshaped in his image over the last eight years, and as the architect of a conservative judiciary that contributed to the removal of his legal difficulties. His allies have spent the past few months carefully selecting candidates for his administration, with the goal of filling key positions with trusted associates.
"These are younger people who are more in the spirit of MAGA. More MAGA and less Republican than before," one donor told Reuters on condition of anonymity, referring to Trump's "Make America Great Again" slogan.
Biden and his aides are already taking steps to do what they can to help Ukraine. For example, they are working rapidly to deliver to the Ukrainians what remains of the $6 billion in weapons and equipment authorized by Congress to help them fight the Russian invasion.
European leaders, who met yesterday in Budapest, called on Trump to maintain support for Ukraine, to refrain from disrupting the global order and to avoid tariff trade wars.
The head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, said that it is now up to the European Union to unite because no EU member can cope with the upcoming challenges alone. Regarding Ukraine, she said: "It is in the interest of all of us that the 'autocrats' of our age receive a very clear message that it is not the right to power that matters, but the rule of law."
In addition to support for Ukraine, Trump's return brings uncertainty about the United States' commitment to NATO.
Alliance chief Mark Rute said it was important to view Ukraine as a problem that transcends Europe's borders, describing Russia's partnership with North Korea as "a threat, not only to the European part of NATO, but also to the US."
It remains unclear what Trump will do, and whether he will even stop arms shipments and contracts with the US defense industry for new air defense systems that will arrive in the coming years. However, as Politiko points out, the Pentagon is unlikely to be able to send everything promised and completely empty those funds by Inauguration Day, given that it takes weeks or months for ammunition and other equipment to reach Ukraine after the US announces the delivery. . When Trump takes office, he could decide not to send those weapons to Kiev - even if they have already been promised, the portal said.
The US president-elect said during the campaign that he could stop the war in Ukraine within 24 hours and hinted that he would pressure Kiev and Moscow to reach a peace agreement, and some Ukrainians fear that this could mean that he would insist on allowing Russia to keep the territories it occupied.
Kiev's official position is that there will be no stopping until every Russian soldier is expelled from Ukrainian territory.
The Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday that Trump's transition team proposed that Kiev promise not to join NATO for the next 20 years in exchange for a deal with Washington to arm Ukraine to deter a Russian attack.
Russian President Vladimir Putin yesterday congratulated Trump on his victory and said that he is ready to talk with him, because any idea about facilitating the end of the Ukraine crisis deserves attention. Putin also said he was impressed with the way Trump handled the assassination attempt in July, describing him as a brave man.
Earlier yesterday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that the Russian leadership remembers Trump's words about trying to resolve the Ukraine crisis, even if he exaggerated the speed with which he could achieve it. "If the new administration seeks peace and not the continuation of the war, it will be better compared to the previous one," Peskov told reporters.
Other areas where the Biden administration could try to cement its changes include taking action at the United Nations against Israeli settlements in the West Bank. However, Trump could quickly reverse many, if not all, of such moves.
Seven days before the election, Trump said that Benjamin Netanyahu is "doing a good job," but "Biden is trying to stop him... and he should probably be doing the opposite." Earlier this year, he said of the Israeli government: "They have to finish what they started."
There are areas where Trump could agree with Biden's latest decisions, such as tough measures on trade or the Chinese Communist Party.
On trade, Trump is expected to restore policies he favored during his first term, especially tariffs, which he called "the most beautiful word."
That could spark a dispute with China, the world's second-largest economy, threaten relations with allies and cause disruption in global industries from carmakers to chip makers.
During the final months of his first term, Trump achieved some success in "protecting" his foreign policy from potential changes under the Biden administration. Trump and his team implemented several decisions that the Biden administration, for political and other reasons, could not or did not want to reverse, Politico points out.
The Trump administration has declared China's repression of the Muslim Uyghur population to be genocide, added Cuba to the list of state sponsors of terrorism and designated Yemen's Houthi militant group as a foreign terrorist organization. Biden reversed some of those moves, such as the decision to designate the Houthis as a terrorist group, but kept many. His team believed that it would be politically unacceptable for them to do the opposite, and in some cases they agreed with the decisions of the Trump administration or were politically convenient for them, such as the decision on Cuba.
One official told Politico that the Biden administration will not sit idly by in the coming months, but officials are aware of their limitations.
"We are aware of the limits of our power and the scope and reach of the power that Donald Trump will inherit on day one," one US official told Politico.
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