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Trump turns to Congress for help in his election fight (nationthailand.com)

Trump turns to Congress for help in his election fight

InternationalDec 10. 2020President Trump is pictured on Dec. 5, 2020, in Valdosta, Ga. Trump’s congressional allies met privately to pitch a plan about contesting the results of the presidential election. MUST CREDIT: Washington Post photo by Jabin Botsford 

By The Washington Post · Rachael Bade, Josh Dawsey, Tom Hamburger

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump is shifting his focus to Congress after the courts roundly rejected his bid to overturn the results of the election, pressuring congressional Republicans into taking a final stand to keep him in power.

Trump’s push is part of a multipronged approach as he also seeks to lobby state and federal lawmakers to give him cover for his unsubstantiated claims of widespread voter fraud, as well as rally support for a last-gasp legal challenge in the Supreme Court that election law experts almost universally dismiss.

The president has been calling Republicans, imploring them to keep fighting and more loudly proclaim the election was stolen while pressing them on what they plan to do. He spoke to Arizona GOP Party Chairwoman Kelli Ward and Rep. Mike Johnson, R-La., head of the conservative Republican Study Committee, on Wednesday, and is expected to meet Thursday at the White House with several state attorneys general. Meanwhile, Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s personal lawyer and point man in the legal fight, has been making similar calls from the hospital, where he is being treated for covid-19.

The president also has enlisted Vice President Mike Pence to reach out to governors and other party leaders in key states to see what else can be done to help the president. A person familiar with the calls said Pence has not exerted pressure for lawmakers to take specific actions and sees them as “checking in.”

The individual spoke on the condition of anonymity to speak frankly. The vice president’s office declined to comment. Tim Murtaugh of the Trump campaign also declined to comment.

Meanwhile, on Capitol Hill, Trump’s conservative allies in the House have been privately buttonholing GOP senators, seeking to enlist one to join in objecting to slates of electors on Jan. 6, according to multiple people familiar with their effort who requested anonymity to discuss their plans.

On that day, Congress meets in joint session to count the electoral votes and declare Joe Biden as the 46th president – with Pence presiding. But if a member of the House and Senate challenge a state’s results, the whole Congress would vote – and the GOP plotting all but assures the routine process could take a dramatic turn, forcing Republicans to choose between accepting the election results or Trump’s bid to overturn the outcome.

Trump has called a number of informal, campaign and White House advisers and asked for help, according to three people who have spoken to him and discussed the calls on the condition of anonymity.

“The request is more, can you feel people out to see if they think the election is a fraud, and are you willing to help us overturn it,” said one person familiar with Trump’s calls, who described it as a “last-ditch effort.” “He’s asking people to check in with their contacts in various battleground states to measure whether there is an appetite to take action from the legislature. He says, ‘Why don’t you see what this person says? Why don’t you see what that person says?”

The pressure on Republicans will grow more intense after the electors meet in each state Monday and cast their votes and as Trump’s hopes in the courts continue to fade. Republicans who have spent four years catering to Trump’s desires could face a choice for which they will be judged in the 2022 midterm elections and 2024 if they have presidential ambitions as the GOP has shown unfettered loyalty to Trump.

Biden won the election with 306 electoral college votes to Trump’s 232, and he leads the national popular vote by more than 7 million. Trump, who has refused to concede, has repeatedly pushed baseless claims and outright falsehoods, insisting that the election was rigged.

Courts and judges across the country have flatly rejected the claims of the Trump campaign and his allies, citing the lack of substantial evidence for his allegations of voter fraud. The effort reached a new nadir on Tuesday when the Supreme Court denied a bid by allies of Trump to reverse Biden’s win in Pennsylvania. Losses also continue to pile up in Arizona, Nevada and Michigan.

None of the handful of lawsuits that remain outstanding are expected to ultimately go Trump’s way. In Wisconsin, a challenge to the results of a partial recount remains pending before a state circuit judge, and a separate federal suit filed by Trump is also unresolved. In Georgia, a small number of suits – including a last-ditch effort by the Republican National Committee – is also still pending.

Rebuffed by the courts, Trump is seeking to enlist another branch of government – Congress – to do his bidding. Some of his fiercest Hill allies are taking up the charge and pressuring their GOP colleagues to join the effort.

Trump called Johnson Wednesday morning, requesting that the conservative leader rally House Republicans to sign onto an amicus brief in an 11th hour Texas lawsuit seeking unprecedented judicial intervention in disallowing the results from four key swing states that went for Biden: Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia and Pennsylvania. Johnson eagerly obliged, emailing all House Republicans to solicit signatures for the long-shot Texas case.

In the email, Johnson wrote that Trump “will be anxiously awaiting the final list to review,” ensuring Republicans knew the president would be apprised of who signed on and who didn’t.

“Most of my Republican colleagues in the House, and countless millions of our constituents across the country, now have serious concerns with the integrity of our election system,” Johnson said in a statement. “The purpose of our amicus brief will be to articulate this concern and express our sincere belief that the great importance of this issue merits a full and careful consideration by the court.”

Separately, more than two dozen members of the House Freedom Caucus and other conservatives signed a letter to Trump requesting that he direct Attorney General William Barr to appoint a special counsel to investigate “irregularities” in the election – though Barr himself said last week that the Justice Department had found no evidence to overturn the election results.

In the Senate, Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Chairman Ron Johnson, R-Wis., announced that he would hold a hearing on election “irregularities” on Dec. 16 – two days after the electoral college casts its votes.

Many Republicans have echoed Trump’s baseless claims. Ward, who tweeted that she spoke to Trump, reiterated many of the claims about alleged problems with the election that she and her lawyers have been making unsuccessfully in court in recent weeks. The Arizona Supreme Court rejected her latest case, a formal election contest seeking to annul Biden’s victory, on Tuesday evening, affirming a lower-court ruling that found no evidence of misconduct, fraud or widespread errors.

In Michigan, pressure on state legislators to intervene with the selection of electors continues with daily calls to specific Republican lawmakers in Lansing from Jenna Ellis and other members of the president’s legal team. A state legislative staffer said Wednesday that among the items being discussed by Republicans is whether to intervene or support the Texas case Trump is staking everything on.

On Wednesday, House Republicans in Lansing also issued a statement calling for subpoena powers to be granted to the House Oversight Committee to investigate claims of fraud in the state’s ballot count. Separately, by a vote of 4-3, the Michigan Supreme Court Wednesday rejected a legal appeal of a case challenging the Michigan results.

At the same time, attorneys general in 17 states Trump won tried to apply pressure on the Supreme Court to take up the Texas complaint filed by state Attorney General Ken Paxton, a Trump ally. The court has told the four targeted states – Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Georgia – to respond by Thursday afternoon.

States have constitutional authority to set the rules of an election, and it is almost unheard of for another state to challenge them. But those states supporting Texas said they are protecting their own voters.

Trump has turned it into something of a showdown at the Supreme Court, writing on Twitter Wednesday, “This is the big one. Our Country needs a victory!”

Trump has continued to call state lawmakers in Georgia, Michigan and Pennsylvania, advisers say, following the news closely in all three states.

The Jan. 6 date in Congress looms large as Trump’s last chance, with the purpose of calls to state lawmakers to get them to pressure members of Congress. Rep. Mo Brooks, R-Ala., has said he will challenge the results though it is unclear how many slates of electors he and other Trump allies plan to contest.

The question is whether they can find a Senate Republican to join their effort to trigger votes in the House and Senate.

Earlier this week, Brooks and Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., leader of the House Freedom Caucus, met privately with the Senate Republican Steering Committee leaders, including Sens. Mike Lee, R-Utah, and Ted Cruz, R-Texas. According to people familiar with the meeting who spoke on the condition of anonymity, the House members pitched both men on their plan and made clear that they need a Senate Republican to join their effort.

The offices of both senators declined to comment on the meeting or whether the senators would heed the request. Asked about the matter Tuesday, Cruz dodged the question and said the courts would be the final decision on the election.

“There are multiple lawsuits raising allegations of fraud and irregularities in this election,” Cruz said. “We need to allow the judicial process to work its way through and resolve those claims.”

Conservatives also have been eyeing Sens. Rand Paul, R-Ky., and Josh Hawley, R-Mo., who may have future presidential ambitions and would join the effort to make a last stand for Trump.

Republicans also hope to recruit Sen. Kelly Loeffler, R-Ga., who is locked in a competitive Georgia runoff election set for Jan. 5. Conservatives believe that if she were to announce that she will join the House effort and object to state electors, Loeffler could rally the GOP base and secure her election against Democrat Raphael Warnock.

Loeffler’s office did not return a request for comment, but one individual familiar with the recruitment process said conservatives have been in touch with her.

If the whole Congress is forced to vote, it would likely fail in the Democratic-controlled House and face resistance in the Senate.

“It’s just simply madness,” said Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah. “The idea of supplanting the vote of the people with partisan legislators, is, is so completely out of our national character that it’s simply mad. Of course the president has the right to challenge results in court, to have recounts. But this effort to subvert the vote of the people is dangerous and destructive of the cause of democracy.”

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U.S., states sue Facebook as an illegal monopoly, setting stage for potential breakup (nationthailand.com)

U.S., states sue Facebook as an illegal monopoly, setting stage for potential breakup

InternationalDec 10. 2020

By The Washington Post · Tony Romm

WASHINGTON – The U.S. government and 48 attorneys general filed landmark antitrust lawsuits against Facebook on Wednesday, seeking to break up the social-networking giant over charges it engaged in illegal, anti-competitive tactics to buy, bully or kill its rivals.

The twin lawsuits filed in federal district court allege that Facebook and its chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, had behaved as an unlawful monopoly for years – one that repeatedly had weaponized its vast stores of data, seemingly limitless wealth and savvy corporate muscle to ascend into one of the most widely used services around the world.

The state and federal complaints chiefly challenge Facebook’s past acquisition of two companies: Instagram, a photo-sharing tool, and WhatsApp, a messaging service. Investigators said the purchases ultimately helped Facebook remove potential potent rivals from the digital marketplace, allowing the tech giant to enrich itself on advertising dollars at the cost of users, who had fewer social-networking options at their disposal.

The lawsuits together represent the most significant political and legal threats to Facebook in its roughly 17-year history, setting up a high-profile clash between U.S. regulators and one of Silicon Valley’s most profitable firms that could take years to resolve. Antitrust regulators explicitly asked a court to consider forcing Facebook to sell off Instagram and WhatsApp to remedy their competition concerns, seeking a punishment that could severely constrain Facebook’s ambitions.

The Federal Trade Commission, led by Republican Chairman Joe Simons, brought its lawsuit in a D.C. district court. Ian Conner, the director of the agency’s Bureau of Competition, said in a statement the FTC seeks to “provide a foundation for future competitors to grow and innovate without the threat of being crushed by Facebook.”

Letitia James, the Democratic attorney general of New York, led her Democratic and Republican counterparts from dozens of states and territories in filing their complaint in the same venue. Appearing at a news conference, James sharply rebuked Facebook for having put “profits ahead of consumers’ welfare and privacy.”

“Today, we are sending a clear and strong message to Facebook and every other company that any efforts to stifle competition, hurt small business, reduce innovation and creativity, [and] cut privacy protections, will be met with the full force of our offices,” James said.

State, federal antitrust charges against Facebook could come as soon as November, sources say

The lawsuits drew rebuke from Facebook, which pledged to “vigorously defend” its business practices in a sign of conflict to come.

“People and small businesses don’t choose to use Facebook’s free services and advertising because they have to, they use them because our apps and services deliver the most value,” Jennifer Newstead, the company’s vice president and general counsel, said in a statement.

Zuckerberg, appearing frequently on Capitol Hill in recent years similarly has argued that the Web remains sufficiently competitive, bolstered by new companies including TikTok that did not exist years ago. Privately, he has told employees he would “go to the mat” to defend against an antitrust lawsuit he saw as an “existential” threat to the company, according to audio unearthed last year.

The lawsuit reflects the vast dissatisfaction with Silicon Valley that has come to pervade all levels of government in the United States. For years, state and federal regulators had maintained a hands-off approach to the tech industry, even as watchdogs in Europe and around the world began to probe and penalize Facebook and its digital peers for their practices. But a series of high-profile scandals and missteps have brought Democrats and Republicans into rare accord as they seek anew to challenge Silicon Valley over its ever-expanding footprint – and the consequences it poses to corporate rivals and consumers alike.

Last month, the Justice Department filed a similarly sweeping antitrust lawsuit against Google, saying the company struck special deals and engaged in other wrongful tactics to expand the reach of its search and advertising empires. Antitrust watchdogs similarly have set their eyes on Apple and Amazon, raising the potential for additional antitrust action to come. (Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos owns the Washington Post.)

U.S. investigators initiated antitrust probes targeting Facebook last year. Dozens of attorneys general led by James in New York promised a broad review of Facebook’s business, aiming to explore the nexus between its digital dominance and ever-growing efforts to siphon users’ data. The FTC, meanwhile, took aim at Facebook almost immediately after concluding an investigation into the company over its entanglement with Cambridge Analytica, a political consultancy, that forced the tech giant to pay a $5 billion penalty.

Facebook will have to pay a record-breaking fine for violating users’ privacy. But the FTC wanted more.

Immediately, regulators turned their attention to Facebook’s purchase of Instagram for $1 billion in 2012 and WhatsApp for $19 billion in 2014, two deals that the government could have blocked at the time but did not. For Facebook, the two transactions reflected its aggressive attempts at the time to pivot to smartphone devices as millions of users began to spend more time on iPhone and Android apps than desktop computers and traditional websites.

State and federal investigators, however, found that the two acquisitions reflected a troubling strategy at Facebook dating back more than a decade – an aggressive ploy to buy or kill competitive threats, large or small, before they could sap away the social-networking giant’s popularity.

The government lawsuits at times point to correspondence from Zuckerberg himself, who acknowledged in 2012 – before purchasing Instagram – that Facebook had fallen “very behind” in photo sharing and needed to make the critical acquisition to catch up, according to the FTC complaint. In making its move, Facebook sought to wield its “power as a sword,” the state attorneys general said, threatening negative repercussions if Instagram did not agree to a sale.

State and federal investigators detailed a similar troubling pattern with WhatsApp, highlighting additional emails from Zuckerberg, who saw the company and other messaging services at the time as “the next biggest consumer risk” for his social-networking empire. In 2013, a year before the acquisition, the once-independent WhatsApp even had outpaced Facebook’s own messenger product globally as measured by the number of messages sent daily.

In acquiring the company, Facebook initially promised users that it would preserve WhatsApp’s independence and strong privacy protections, state investigators said. But Facebook reversed course years later, frustrating regulators, who said the bait-and-switch had the effect of eliminating a privacy-protective competitor from the digital marketplace.

Facebook on Wednesday sought to rebut the charges: Newstead, the company’s general counsel, stressed that WhatsApp and Instagram became successful precisely because of the tech giant’s massive investments in them.

“This is revisionist history. Antitrust laws exist to protect consumers and promote innovation, not to punish successful businesses,” she said, arguing that federal regulators could have stopped the Instagram and WhatsApp deals but ultimately did not at the time.

“The government now wants a do-over, sending a chilling warning to American business that no sale is ever final,” she said.

The argument has hardly dissuaded the company’s critics, including those in Congress, who found reason for suspicion after concluding their own antitrust investigation this year. The review unearthed a trove of emails from Zuckerberg and his lieutenants apparently plotting against competitors in a series of discussions in which they referenced making a “land grab” for rival apps. Legal experts also said that the government was well within its rights to challenge those transactions on grounds that it ultimately enabled Facebook to act anti-competitively.

Investigators on Wednesday also faulted Facebook for the way in which the company manages its vast trove of user data and the policies that govern when and how third-party app developers and other companies can access it. Such tactics allowed Facebook to stamp out potential rivals before they could become too popular, investigators found.

In 2013, for example, Facebook sought to stop the rise of Vine, a short-video service launched by Twitter, the FTC complaint says. Facebook that January cut Vine off from accessing Facebook’s features, such as users’ friend lists, restricting its growth, according to the federal agency.

“Facebook has hindered, suppressed, and deterred the emergence and growth of rival personal social networking providers, and unlawfully maintained its monopoly in the U.S. personal social networking market, other than through merits competition,” the FTC said.

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Johnson fails to get Brexit deal at Supper Summit in Brussels (nationthailand.com)

Johnson fails to get Brexit deal at Supper Summit in Brussels

InternationalDec 10. 2020Prime Minister Boris Johnson/File photo 

By The Washington Post · Karla Adam, Michael Birnbaum, William Booth

LONDON – It was another of those make-or-break moments for a Brexit deal that ended in a fizzle. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson traveled to Brussels on Wednesday night for a dinner meeting with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, a tête-à-tête the British media dubbed Johnson’s “date with destiny.” The two talked, but no breakthrough was made.

Some feared that the dinner date could be a “last supper” before all hope of a post-Brexit trade and security deal crumbles. But the two sides agreed to send their representatives back to the negotiating table. Britain leaves the European Union in 22 days.

“We had a lively and interesting discussion on the state of play across the list of outstanding issues,” von der Leyen said after the dinner. “We gained a clear understanding of each other’s positions. They remain far apart.”

The European Commission president said in a statement that the two leaders agreed that their negotiating teams “should immediately reconvene to try to resolve these essential issues.”

Johnson left without speaking with reporters. “Very large gaps remain between the two sides and it is still unclear whether these can be bridged,” Downing Street said in a statement, adding that the prime minister “does not want to leave any route to a possible deal untested.”

Johnson and von der Leyen agreed that by Sunday a firm decision should be made about the future of the talks.

And so the British prime minister and the European Commission president did not forge a future relationship based on a bilateral pact. But they had a nice meal. Fish was on the menu – scallops and turbot – and fishing rights at the top of the talks.

Before Johnson left for Brussels, there was much huffing and puffing in London and Brussels over the last-ditch mission, just three weeks before Britain’s 11-month transition period expires at the end of the month.

The dinner between the two leaders was designed to reset the dynamics and unlock further discussions. Others suspected that it could help either side get an edge on the inevitable blame game that will ensue if Britain ends up crashing out without a deal after four decades in the world’s richest trading club.

Tim Bale, a politics professor at Queen Mary, University of London, said, “If they are going to get a deal, it’s best for both sides if it looks as if it was tough negotiating but they pulled off a miracle at the last minute.”

Bale cautioned, “By all accounts, they were quite a long way apart, even on most basic issues, even a few days ago.” He handicapped the possibility for an eventual deal at 50/50.

Both sides insist that an abrupt – and possibly chaotic – departure remains a possibility.

The meeting pitted Johnson against a frugal and precise former German defense minister who started as head of the European Union’s executive branch a year ago.

The two leaders share some basic traits. Like Johnson, von der Leyen spent some of her formative years in Brussels as the child of a senior E.U. official. They went to the same Brussels high school for the children of European bureaucrats, though their tenures did not overlap. Like Johnson, she is the parent of a large family: seven children in her case, six or more – the precise number is uncertain – in his.

But Johnson likes to bluster his way past the facts, and von der Leyen likes to muster them. He likes to live large – big Italian red wines and weekends at Chequers, the prime minister’s official countryside estate. She arranged for a tiny apartment to be constructed at the sprawling European Commission headquarters so she could skip the commute to work.

“You run a tight ship,” Johnson told von der Leyen on Wednesday as they entered their meeting, after he sought to take off his mask without keeping a pandemic-friendly distance from her. She politely corrected him, allowed masks off for a moment for the photographers, then told him to put it back on again as they drew close.

The dinner menu was rich with symbolism: French and British fishermen have clashed in the English Channel over scallops, with access to British fishing waters a major subject of contention in the talks.

Earlier in the day, when Johnson was still in London, he complained to Parliament about the European Union’s demands.

“If they pass a new law in the future with which we in this country don’t comply . . . they want the automatic right to punish us and to retaliate,” he said. “And secondly, they are saying that the U.K. should be the only country in the world not to have sovereign control over its fishing waters.”

These were not terms that “any prime minister of this country should accept,” he said.

Britain wants to be able to “take back control” of its sovereignty – for many Brexiteers, that was the whole point of leaving the bloc.

But Europe appears in little mood for compromise.

The disagreements have touched on areas that have been sore points for years – in some cases centuries.

Belgium’s Flemish fishermen have declared that they have eternal fishing rights in British waters because of a 1666 charter granted by King Charles II to the citizens of Bruges.

“We believe the privilege to still be valid today,” said Flemish Economy Minister Hilde Crevits.

The European Union also does not want Britain undercutting it on issues such as state aid and environmental regulations to gain a competitive advantage. It wants to make sure that British rules stay closely aligned with E.U. ones as a prerequisite for Britain to get relatively unfettered access to the European market.

If a deal is not struck, Britain’s exit could be messy and costly. Its trading relationship with its biggest trading partner would default to World Trade Organization rules, meaning overnight tariffs and quotas that would hit both sides, clogging ports and supply chains.

Time is in short supply. A stripped-down trade deal could be approved by leaders and the European Parliament alone, easing passage by Dec. 31. But if there is a more complicated bargain, some national parliaments would also have to ratify it, increasing the possibility of a misstep that leads to Britain dropping out of the European market on Dec. 31 without a safety net.

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Europe seeks to reset relations with U.S., turn page on Trump (nationthailand.com)

Europe seeks to reset relations with U.S., turn page on Trump

InternationalDec 10. 2020President- elect Joe Biden speaks at a news conference on Tuesday, Dec. 8, 2020. MUST CREDIT: Washington Post photo by Demetrius Freeman 

By The Washington Post · Michael Birnbaum

European leaders plan to use a summit that starts Thursday to agree on a new strategy to rebuild strained relations with the United States after four years of a divide-and-conquer approach from President Donald Trump.

From rebuilding the Iran nuclear deal to fighting the pandemic to addressing climate change, Europeans are scrambling to seize the moment with the incoming U.S. leader. Because of Joe Biden’s age and history, many in the bloc say he will be more interested in cooperation with Europe than any U.S. president for the foreseeable future, Democrat or Republican.

But leaders on both sides of the Atlantic warn that some of the irritants of the Trump years will remain, and that other divides could still open – especially on what may be the greatest foreign policy challenge of Biden’s presidency, an increasingly aggressive and expansionist Beijing. European countries vary on how they think they should manage relations with China. The most populous and most powerful country in Europe, Germany, also has the closest trading relationship with Beijing.

European leaders also have become embroiled in an intramural debate about the extent to which they should seek independence from the United States, a goal increasingly pushed by French President Emmanuel Macron and opposed by Germany and others.

“We must be able to act multilaterally when we can. This is our preference,” E.U. foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said this week after European foreign ministers discussed transatlantic strategy at a meeting in Brussels. But Europe must also “be able to act autonomously when we must, in order to promote and defend more effectively our interests and values.”

Trump frequently had Europe in his crosshairs, declaring the European Union his greatest “foe” on trade issues and slapping around Germany and others for defense spending that failed to meet NATO pledges. Unlike President Barack Obama, who declared ahead of Britain’s June 2016 referendum on membership within the European Union that he wanted Britain to remain, Trump stoked Brexit.

“Everyone around the world who wishes to see us divided has been opening bottles of Champagne the last few years. That is not OK anymore,” the E.U. ambassador to the United States, Stavros Lambrinidis, said at a panel on transatlantic relations last week.

Although it may be Europe’s turn to pop the bubbly, many policymakers are cautious about how permanent the reprieve from Trumpism may be.

“There’s a sense that this is the last chance,” given the possibility that a Trump ally could recapture the White House in 2024, said Rosa Balfour, the head of the Brussels office of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a think tank.

Many of Biden’s pledges align neatly with E.U. priorities. The European Commission has issued a strategy paper that details a long list of issues it hopes to tackle with the Biden administration.

Europeans want the United States back in the World Health Organization and as a leader in global efforts to combat the pandemic – as Biden has said he would make happen from Day 1. They want Washington to rejoin the Paris climate accord, another first-day plan for the incoming Biden administration. They are laying the groundwork for a revival of the Iran nuclear deal, meeting next week in Vienna to formally invite the United States to rejoin the accord after Trump pulled the plug on U.S. involvement. And they hope Biden will drop Trump’s tariffs on steel and aluminum imports and take a more conciliatory approach to trade issues.

And at NATO, a transatlantic group of strategists released a plan last week to adjust the alliance in the next decade to attune it more toward threats from China, a shift that would bring it more in line with U.S. security preoccupations.

“It’s both wonderful and scary because if we screw up this window, it’ll just be heart-wrenching,” said Anthony Gardner, who was U.S. ambassador to the European Union under Obama and advised the Biden campaign on Europe issues.

But Gardner said some of the biggest issues – including China – may be thorny, in part because Europe itself remains divided.

“We really should be more aligned on China, but getting between that statement of intent and the actual delivery is going to be hard,” Gardner said.

The continent has become more skeptical of Beijing during Trump’s term, but some countries remain dependent on trade with China even as a growing number have agreed to keep Huawei out of their infrastructure systems, a U.S. priority.

“If Europe can’t solve these differences within, it’s very difficult to propose to the U.S. a proactive plan,” Balfour said.

Biden brings a long history to the relationship with Europe, first with his longtime chairmanship of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and later as vice president, when he was frequently dispatched around the world to resolve thorny issues of international affairs.

That is good and bad for Europe, given that Trump’s anger that Europe is not as active in global security issues was largely an undiplomatic reformulation of frustrations from the Obama years.

When Biden, as vice president, met in Rome with Italy’s then-president, Giorgio Napolitano, shortly after the Arab Spring, he complained that the United States was standing alone against Syrian President Bashar Assad as he stoked a bloody war in his country, according to an adviser to Napolitano.

“Biden told Napolitano, ‘We have said what the red lines are in Syria, but we don’t see anyone raising their hands and saying we’re with you,’ ” said Stefano Stefanini, a former Italian diplomat who was Napolitano’s diplomatic counselor at the time.

Although Europe’s engagement with security issues in its neighborhood is still lagging, Stefanini said, the bigger irritant may be in its relations with Russia.

“Europeans have to realize that given the way the ground has shifted between China and the U.S. in the last four years, the idea that exists in some European corners – to continue trading with China as if the rivalry between the U.S. and China is not Europe’s business – cannot apply,” Stefanini said.

European divisions are deep enough that they may struggle to be a strong partner to the United States on all of Washington’s priorities. At the leaders’ summit Thursday and Friday, they will discuss Brexit, their tumultuous relationship with Turkey and their fight with Hungary and Poland about rule-of-law issues.

Relations with Washington will be one of the few areas of concord.

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Like Trump, Biden has promised to end ‘forever wars’ (nationthailand.com)

Like Trump, Biden has promised to end ‘forever wars’

InternationalDec 10. 2020

By The Washington Post · Dan Lamothe

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump took office after repeatedly promising to “beat the hell” out of the Islamic State and end the United States’ “endless wars.” But reality proved more complicated.

Although his administration oversaw the destruction of the Islamic State’s caliphate in Syria and a Special Operations raid that killed its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, remnants of the group remain active in several countries.

Meanwhile, the U.S. military is still involved in Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and other terrorism hot spots after four years of Trump vowing to bring troops home.

President-elect Joe Biden is expected to face a similar landscape – and political pressure – as he takes over the White House.

In similar fashion to Trump, Biden has said it is time to “end the forever wars,” a catchall for 19 years of military operations launched in response to the September 2001 terrorist attacks. Thousands of U.S. troops – and many more civilians – have been killed since then, and trillions of dollars have been spent.

But Biden has indicated that ending the wars does not mean shutting down all counterterrorism operations abroad.

Although the “vast majority” of U.S. troops should come home, the United States must “narrowly define” and continue counterterrorism operations targeting al-Qaida and the Islamic State, Biden wrote in Foreign Affairs magazine in the spring.

“We must maintain our focus on counterterrorism, around the world and at home, but staying entrenched in unwinnable conflicts drains our capacity to lead on other issues that require our attention, and it prevents us from rebuilding the other instruments of American power,” he wrote.

Early on, the Trump administration sought to reorient itself to prioritize “great power competition” with China and Russia above counterterrorism, and defense officials have said they wanted to make the shift “irreversible.”

But many of the longtime areas of conflict remain just as turbulent.

In Afghanistan, Biden must decide how to handle a delicate situation in which Trump signed a deal with the Taliban that calls for the removal of all U.S. troops by May. U.S. officials have said the agreement will be based on the conditions on the ground, but Trump nonetheless announced plans to cut the number of U.S. troops in Afghanistan to 2,500 by the end of his term, overriding concerns from senior U.S. commanders and former defense secretary Mark Esper.

In Iraq, the United States has the approval to keep a residual military force to train Iraqi forces and watch for any resurgence of the Islamic State, Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said recently. But the situation is complicated by Iran, whose proxy forces repeatedly have launched rockets at American military positions. Iran also has vowed revenge for the U.S. killing in Baghdad of Qasem Soleimani, an Iranian general whom U.S. officials have blamed for the deaths of hundreds of Americans.

In Syria, the United States has kept about 1,000 service members deployed in what the Trump administration has said is an effort to protect oil fields from the Islamic State. But the situation is complex, with forces backing the Syrian regime, including Russians, also in the region.

U.S. Special Operations troops also remain in small numbers in Somalia, Yemen and western Africa.

Biden will have to assess risks, including threats to U.S. service members, when examining the future size of any mission, and whether to continue it, said David Maxwell, a retired Special Forces colonel and senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Arrogance, Maxwell said, has on occasion led to decisions to leave U.S. units without enough support, allowing American fatalities.

“We must be asking: Does this mission fit into our national security strategy?” he said. “It’s a basic equation: Is the benefit [of] conducting this operation worth the cost of conducting it if it goes wrong?”

Michael Nagata, a retired Army general and former director of strategy for the National Counterterrorism Center, said the idea that the United States should focus less on counterterrorism and more on other issues is a “bankrupt premise.” For example, he said, less than three years after the U.S. military withdrew from Iraq, it launched operations there again against the Islamic State in 2014.

“I hear this riff all the time: ‘We’ve got to rebalance,’ as though this is somehow a zero-sum game,” said Nagata, now a distinguished senior fellow with the Middle East Institute. “I understand how attractive that idea is – it’s just completely unrealistic. It never works. It never lasts.”

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Poland, Hungary say deal struck on $2.2 trillion EU stimulus (nationthailand.com)

Poland, Hungary say deal struck on $2.2 trillion EU stimulus

InternationalDec 10. 2020European Union (EU) flags fly at half mast following the death of Valery Giscard d’Estaing, France’s former president, outside the headquarters of the European Commission in Brussels on Dec. 4, 2020. MUST CREDIT; Bloomberg photo by Geert Vanden Wijngaert. 

By Syndication Washington Post, Bloomberg · Wojciech Moskwa, Zoltan Simon

Poland and Hungary have agreed on a compromise with Germany to unblock the European Union’s $2.2 trillion budget and pandemic stimulus plan, a senior government official in Warsaw said.

The compromise would end a standoff that saw Budapest and Warsaw threaten to torpedo the EU’s 750 billion-euro ($909 billion) pandemic aid fund and the 2021-2027 budget over objections to attaching rule-of-law conditions to cash.

Polish Deputy Prime Minister Jaroslaw Gowin said an agreement had been clinched with Germany, which holds the EU’s rotating presidency, that would now be presented to the rest of the bloc. A deal could be finalized by Friday by the end of a two-day summit of European leaders in Brussels, he said. A German spokeswoman said a solution hadn’t been reached yet and all member states would need to sign off.

“For now we have agreement between Warsaw, Budapest and Berlin,” Gowin, the government’s biggest advocate of Poland dropping its veto threat, told reporters Wednesday in Warsaw. “I believe this agreement will also include the 24 remaining European capitals.”

The deal was confirmed by a Hungarian official familiar with the state of talks who commented on the condition of not being named. An EU diplomat said officials were waiting for final confirmation that an arrangement had been reached.

A solution would offer a climb-down for Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban and Polish counterpart Mateusz Morawiecki, who’d backed themselves into a corner over their opposition to the money being tied to democratic standards.

EU ambassadors will meet on Wednesday to discuss the budget situation, according to an official.

The proposal being considered would clarify that the rule-of-law mechanism would only apply to new outlays from the EU, with its implementation only happening after the European Court of Justice weighed in, according to two people familiar with the matter who asked not to be named as the discussions are private.

Gowin declined to go into details about the deal, saying only that it keeps “Poland sovereign and the EU united.”

“We know that this veto from Hungary and Poland exists because the financial framework is connected to the rule of law principle,” German deputy government spokeswoman Martina Fietz said in Berlin when asked about whether a deal had been reached. “The chancellor has made clear this morning that she cannot say yet whether a solution will be achieved.”

The zloty jumped 0.7% to the highest level against the euro since September on news of the EU deal. The forint also gained.

The budget holdouts said the link threatened to cut their funding and undermine their governments, which are being probed for alleged violations of the bloc’s norms.

The deadlock threatened at least 180 billion euros that Hungary and Poland were due to receive in the coming years, as well as also payouts that are urgently needed to help ease the record recessions caused by the virus.

It also would have triggered an emergency budget for the EU from Jan. 1, which would have seen funding plunge in almost all areas and potentially put Poland and Hungary at the back of the line for even the limited development aid that would be available in this case.

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Migrant caravans head to U.S. border, giving Biden an early test (nationthailand.com)

Migrant caravans head to U.S. border, giving Biden an early test

InternationalDec 10. 2020Residents inspect destroyed houses in the coastal neighborhood of El Muelle after Hurricane Iota made landfall in Bilwi, Nicaragua, on Nov. 20, 2020. MUST CREDIT: Bloomberg photo by Carlos Herrera. 

By Syndication Washington Post, Bloomberg · Michael McDonald, Eric Martin

President-elect Joe Biden says his priorities when he takes office next month will be the pandemic and economic recovery, but he’s facing another crisis that won’t wait: a wave of desperate migrants on his southern border.

Two ruinous hurricanes that wrecked and flooded swathes of Central America last month have increased the number of families planning a risky journey northward. And after a year of travel bans and soaring unemployment, demand to reach the U.S. was already high.

“There are going to be caravans, and in the coming weeks it will increase,” said Jose Luis Gonzalez, coordinator of the Guatemala Red Jesuita con Migrantes, a non-governmental organization. “People are no longer scared of the coronavirus. They’re going hungry, they’ve lost everything and some towns are still flooded.”

Biden has pledged to abolish many of the migration policies of President Donald Trump, including prolonged detention and separation of families, which were designed to deter illegal migration. This encourages more impoverished Central Americans to make the trip and test the Biden administration, said Gonzalez.

“When there is a change in government in the U.S. or Mexico, caravans start to move because they are testing the waters to see how authorities respond,” he said. “What they see is that the one who said he was going to build a wall and hated Latinos is on his way out.”

On social media, announcements are circulating for caravans, groups of migrants traveling together, leaving San Pedro Sula, Honduras’s second-largest city, which was hit by both storms. The first caravan is scheduled to leave in the coming days and the second in mid-January.

Biden’s advisers are hoping to shift away from Trump’s policies without signaling that the border has been flung open, according to people familiar with the planning. They know that swift, sweeping changes will spur more people to attempt the journey to the U.S.

“President-elect Joe Biden will restore order, dignity and fairness to our immigration system,” said Ned Price, a spokesman for Biden’s transition. “At its core, his immigration policy will be driven by the need to keep families together and end the disastrous policy of family separation.”

A senior Mexican foreign ministry official said migration is likely to remain one of the main challenges in the U.S.-Mexico relationship, adding that Mexico will continue to promote cooperation for development to address its root causes and plan to handle it together with partners in the region.

Hurricanes Eta and Iota were part of a record-setting Atlantic season with 30 named storms. Eta alone caused $5 billion worth of damage across the region and affected 3 million people, flooding homes and damaging roads, bridges and crops throughout Nicaragua, Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador. Governments are still tallying damages from Iota and water has yet to subside in some towns. The countries were already reeling from the economic slump caused by months of Covid-19 lockdowns.

Victor Espinal, 31, whose home in La Lima, Honduras was flooded by both storms, says he is planning to join one of the caravans. He was laid off at the Chiquita banana packing plant where he worked for eight years, after it flooded, and is afraid he won’t find work again soon.

The house where he lived with his wife, two children and his mother-in-law is now empty, and their mud-soaked mattresses and damaged belongings lay in the street outside.

“There’s nothing for me here now,” he said. “The walls are all that’s left and there isn’t a single piece of furniture, not even a plate to eat off of. I’m not one to cry, but when I returned home I felt like crying. I see memes that say material goods aren’t important, but they are important because people work their whole lives for them and in 15 days, it’s all gone.”

Last month, Guatemala’s president, Alejandro Giammattei, said that without help from rich countries, his citizens and those of surrounding countries would flee.

“If we don’t want hoards of Central Americans looking to move to other countries with better living conditions, we have to make a wall of prosperity in Central America,” he said at an event in Honduras with the Central American Bank for Economic Integration.

Migration from Central America toward Mexico and the U.S. spiked after Hurricane Mitch in 1998 and Hurricane Stan in 2005. Other weather events have also forced Central Americans to abandon their countries in recent years. A study by Inter-American Development Bank showed migration from El Salvador doubled after a severe drought in 2014-15 that hurt corn production.

“The problem in El Salvador and with all these Central American countries is that they’re highly vulnerable to climate events — hurricanes but also extreme droughts,” said IDB Economics Principal Adviser Ana Maria Ibanez. “There is a relationship between migration and extreme weather events.”

As a candidate, Biden called for a $4 billion aid package for Central America and said his administration would address the climate crisis facing the region.

As vice-president to Barack Obama in 2014, Biden led the strategy on confronting the wave of undocumented migrants from Central America. He has a long history of working in Latin America as chairman and ranking member of the Senate foreign relations committee, including the creation of Plan Colombia to combat drug cartels and leftist guerrillas two decades ago.

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Biden faces a changed world and no end of foreign policy challenges from China to Iran (nationthailand.com)

Biden faces a changed world and no end of foreign policy challenges from China to Iran

InternationalDec 10. 2020Members of the Hashd al-Shaabi militia watch as photos featuring Qasem Soleimani and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis are unveiled in Karrada, Baghdad, on Jan. 20. MUST CREDIT: photo for The Washington Post by Emilienne Malfatto. 

By The Washington Post · Karen DeYoung

WASHINGTON – President-elect Joe Biden has received no shortage of advice on how to fill the yawning gap between his “America’s back!” mantra and the challenges facing a world that has undergone major changes since he last served in the White House.

Biden should concern himself less with human rights in China than with finding issues open to American-Chinese cooperation, foreign policy doyen Henry Kissinger counseled. Let Russia win in Syria, advised Aaron Stein, Middle East director of the Foreign Policy Research Institute.

Progressive groups have called on Biden to cancel major weapons programs and get rid of the Trump-era Space Force. Brazil’s environment minister suggested that if Biden wants to save the Amazon, he should pay for it by buying Brazilian carbon credits. NATO’s secretary general has warned against leaving Afghanistan without an allied agreement.

Biden has set out some big principles – pay close attention to the interplay between domestic and international priorities, consult with allies and participate in international institutions, elevate climate to the top of the agenda – along with plans for first-day reversals of some of President Donald Trump’s more egregious departures from historical norms on issues such as immigration.

But on a host of matters in between, Biden faces competing priorities, congressional hurdles and wary, if welcoming, allies. In some cases, such as with North Korea and Venezuela, the most daunting obstacle to foreign policy success is the one that has bedeviled several presidents before him. There are no good options.

The fight against the coronavirus and righting the economy are likely to consume much of the new president’s first-year emphasis and energy. Biden is “inheriting a country in crisis,” said Ellen Laipson, director of the International Security Program at George Mason University.

“Between the pandemic and not traveling and economic pain, it’s not going to be an easy time for the foreign policy crowd. They’re going to have to wait their turn,” she said.

Some issues will not wait.

New START, the only remaining arms control treaty between the United States and Russia, is set to expire two weeks after Biden’s inauguration. The five-year extension Biden has said he plans to offer will give his administration some breathing room to deal with problems that have worsened over the past four years, including Russia’s development of new strategic and nonstrategic weapons not covered in any arms deal, competition in space-based weaponry and cyber aggression.

Russian President Vladimir Putin will doubtless seek relief from sanctions imposed by President Barack Obama and Trump, Stephen Sestanovich, senior fellow for Russian and Eurasian studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, said in a council podcast last week. But Biden, if so inclined, “is likely to find them very hard to dismantle without backtracking on key issues that led to sanctions in the first place,” including Russia’s annexation of Crimea and military aggression in Ukraine, and poison plots against Kremlin enemies.

Although Biden is likely to seek Russian cooperation on Iran and climate change, “it will take a lot of dialogue, particularly on Ukraine, to see if there’s any give on the Russian side that could justify lifting sanctions,” Sestanovich said.

On Iran, powerful bipartisan forces in Congress oppose Biden’s plan to reenter the nuclear deal from which Trump withdrew. Under the agreement, Iran curtailed its uranium enrichment and allowed strict international monitoring of its nuclear program in exchange for the lifting of economic sanctions.

As Obama and Vice President Biden maintained when the deal was signed in 2015, and the president-elect has now said, the nuclear agreement was designed to be a starting point to remove an immediate threat of an Iranian nuclear weapon and set the stage for further negotiations over stemming the Islamic Republic’s proxy wars and missile development.

Trump argued that those things would never happen, and his departure from the deal ensured that they did not during his administration. Biden’s challenge, beyond dealing with political opposition at home, is how to reenter negotiations with an Iran that portrays itself as the aggrieved party and has expressed no interest in dealmaking beyond the original terms of the agreement.

In the interlocked web of national security issues, Biden must also balance U.S. relationships with the rest of the Middle East, where Israel and Arab countries are likely to object to any outreach toward Iran.

Biden said in October that he will “reassess” the relationship Trump cultivated with Saudi Arabia, “end U.S. support for Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen, and make sure America does not check its values at the door to sell arms or buy oil.” Those initiatives are likely to find favor with Congress, which saw Trump veto anti-Saudi legislation.

Biden remains committed to ensuring Israel’s security and does not plan to reverse Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as the Israeli capital and annexation of the Golan Heights. But his opposition to new settlements on occupied land and commitment to a two-state solution with the Palestinians may have less resonance amid new Arab normalization deals with Israel.

At the same time, Biden’s ability to make progress with Iran is an important aspect of his goal to reestablish trans-Atlantic ties with Britain, France and Germany – all still parties to the Iran nuclear deal – and the rest of Europe.

Europe is embroiled in its own problems with the pandemic and rule-of-law rejectionists in countries such as Hungary and Poland, whose leaders Trump embraced. Leading allies are pleased that Biden is a committed trans-Atlanticist who shares their values and has pledged to repair traditional U.S. ties.

But they remain wary about potential contradictions between his vows to reinvigorate U.S. manufacturing and agriculture, and what they hope is an end to Trumpian trade threats and tariffs.

Although Biden has pledged to retain the tens of thousands of U.S. troops who are based as deterrents in Europe, as well as in Japan and North Korea, he also wants to end major deployments to overseas wars, limiting the U.S. presence to relatively small counterterrorism forces of 1,500 to 2,000 to protect the homeland.

That leaves open a lot of questions of interest to NATO and European allies who share responsibility with troops in Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as in Africa.

Biden will take over a world in which the United States, although still a great power, is not necessarily the sole dominant one. “But the passing of U.S. dominance need not mean the end of U.S. leadership,” Jake Sullivan, Biden’s choice as national security adviser, argued in a 2018 essay in Foreign Affairs magazine.

“That is, the United States may not be able to direct outcomes from a position of preeminent economic, political, and military influence,” Sullivan wrote, “but it can still mobilize cooperation on shared challenges and shape consensus on key rules. In the years ahead, although Washington will not be the only destination for countries seeking capital, resources, or influence, it will remain the most important agenda-setter.”

One place where Biden hopes to lead the democratic world in confronting China. Although European allies have sought coordination with the United States on China, U.S. partners in Asia, where neighborhood peace and economies are far more dependent on a smooth relationship with Beijing, are concerned about his intentions.

Biden has not committed to any particular action vis-a-vis China, including the lifting of Trump tariffs or revision of still unrealized trade deals, all of which he has said he will review in terms of how they affect U.S. workers and the economy.

He has called for “pushing back” on “China’s deepening authoritarianism, even as we seek to cooperate on issues where our interests are aligned,” and called on the United States to “speak out” on oppression against Hong Kong and Uighur Muslims.

He has broadly pledged to ensure that China follow international maritime and territorial norms, and said that the United States will greatly increase its diplomatic presence in regional organizations where Trump has largely ceded influence.

Although the Trump administration has beaten the drum against Chinese expansionism and aggression in increasingly bellicose terms, Biden has emphasized a somewhat different approach. He has said he will use the power of U.S. leadership – and a revitalized U.S. economy – to mobilize a more unified global stand against China on all fronts.

“Most important is that we lead once again by the power of our example. America’s commitment to universal values sets us apart from China,” Biden said in written responses to questions posed last summer by the Council on Foreign Relations. “That is how to project a model that others want to emulate, rather than following China’s authoritarian path.”

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Deutsche Bank leans on traders as corporate bank outlook cut (nationthailand.com)

Deutsche Bank leans on traders as corporate bank outlook cut

InternationalDec 10. 2020Christian Sewing
, chief executive officer of Deutsche Bank, at the Frankfurt Finance Summit in Frankfurt, Germany, on June 22, 2020. MUST CREDIT: Bloomberg photo by Peter Juelich. 

By Syndication Washington Post, Bloomberg · Steven Arons

Deutsche Bank said a trading rally that lifted revenue this year continued into the fourth quarter and will help boost growth through 2022, as Chief Executive Officer Christian Sewing relies increasingly on the investment bank for his turnaround plan.

Sewing on Wednesday increased his outlook for the business, saying it will generate 8.5 billion euros ($10.3 billion) of revenue in two years’ time, 600 million euros more than targeted. But headwinds from negative interest rates forced the CEO to cut the forecast for the corporate bank — a centerpiece of his strategy — and lower the group revenue target slightly, to 24.4 billion euros from 24.5 billion euros.

The bigger role for the investment bank — first reported by Bloomberg on Friday — underscores Sewing’s increasing reliance on a trading business he had initially planned to cut back even further, as profit from lending is being eroded by Europe’s negative interest rates. Fixed-income trading is now a bigger revenue contributor than when former investment bank head Anshu Jain took over as co-CEO in 2012.

“We have really underestimated the potential in those businesses where we want to be strong,” Sewing said in a Bloomberg TV interview. “I do believe that a good part of the outperformance we have seen in 2020 is sustainable.”

Deutsche Bank rose 0.9% at 11:56 a.m. in Frankfurt trading. The stock has gained 38% this year, the best performer among the large European lenders. It’s down about 16% since Sewing took over in April 2018.

Trading grew 10% in October and 23% in November from a year earlier, the lender said in a presentation. Deutsche Bank now expects 9.1 billion euros in revenue at the investment bank for 2020, which translates into about 1.7 billion for the fourth quarter, compared with 1.5 billion euros a year ago. The top line is expected to decline next year when market conditions normalize.

Sewing is counting on the additional revenue from trading to help offset 1.2 billion euros in new headwinds from negative interest rates, which hit the corporate bank the hardest. The unit was initially the centerpiece of Sewing’s strategy when he unveiled it in July of last year. Since then, he’s had to adjust revenue expectations twice because of the rate environment, forcing him to rely more on the trading business he had planned to cut back even further.

Germany’s largest lender also gave a goal for net income for the first time since unveiling the new strategy, targeting 4.5 billion euros by 2022, as it steps up cost reductions in the wake of the pandemic. Germany’s largest lender expects to lower its 2022 adjusted costs by 300 million euros more than previously announced, to 16.7 billion euros.

Sewing, a former corporate banker, last year announced Deutsche Bank’s biggest restructuring in at least two decades, exiting equities trading and focusing on businesses where the bank says it has a leading position. He’s cutting 18,000 jobs, or a fifth of the workforce, after several failed turnaround efforts under his predecessors.

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The end of Brexit is finally in sight. What actually happened? (nationthailand.com)

The end of Brexit is finally in sight. What actually happened?

InternationalDec 09. 2020

By The Washington Post · Adam Taylor · WORLD, EUROPE 

It was more than four years ago, back in the heady summer of 2016, that Britain voted to leave the European Union. At the time it seemed like a simple decision about the country’s place in the world. Time has proved otherwise.

Britain’s efforts to depart have involved endless negotiations over arcane details. Two British leaders resigned amid the fallout, contesting bitter intraparty rivalries. And the country’s economy is set to decline nearly 10 percent in 2020 in the face of intertwining sources of uncertainty: Brexit and the coronavirus pandemic.

After all this time, Brexit is finally happening. At the end of the year, the negotiations set in motion by the 2016 vote are due to finish. At the end of a winding journey, it’s time to look back and ask:

What on Earth just happened? And did anyone get what they wanted?

– So, what is Brexit exactly?

Brexit, a portmanteau of “Britain” and “exit,” became a popular term to describe the movement to pull Britain out of the E.U. in 2012, with origins in a long-standing drive to cut Britain’s ties to Europe.

Britain joined European Economic Community, the precursor to the E.U., in 1973. But as the body expanded its scope and powers, it became increasingly controversial in Britain. Some argued that E.U. legislation and rules were holding the country back.

The issue of Britain’s membership in the European Union had been divisive within the center-right Conservative Party for decades. These divisions led to the downfall of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in 1990 after pro-Europe members of Parliament ousted her.

– Why did Britain hold a referendum?

In 2015, Prime Minister David Cameron pushing for a second term. But he was concerned that divisions over the E.U. could send his ruling Conservative Party back to its role as the opposition, where it was stuck from 1997 to 2010.

The United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) was siphoning off support for the Conservatives by running on an explicitly pro-Brexit platform. Polls showed growing support for UKIP and some Conservative figures had defected to the upstart party.

Cameron favored remaining in the E.U., but wanted to give Brexit-backers a reason to support him. So he promised to hold a referendum on the issue if he won the election. At the time, most polling suggested that “remain” would win such a vote. Cameron won reelection comfortably.

But after the date of the referendum was set – June 23, 2016 – the polling began to narrow substantially as popular Conservative figures like Boris Johnson backed Brexit amid a global wave of populism. The “Remainers” eventually lost the vote by a 52-to-48 split. Cameron resigned the morning after the results were announced.

– Why did it take so long to leave the E. U.?

There was no preexisting playbook for a country looking to drop out of the E.U.; it had never been done. Before they could even start planning their future relationship, Britain had to negotiate a withdrawal agreement spelling out the terms of its departure – in negotiation with a 26 nation bloc in which every government has a veto.

Just as tricky were the politics at home. Britain voted in favor of Brexit, but it was never clear what exactly that meant. Some argued that Britain could pursue a “soft Brexit” and seek a close relationship like Norway, an outsider that is essentially bound by many E.U. rules. Others railed against that course as outside the spirit of Brexit and urged a clean break – a “hard Brexit.”

To make matters worse, Britain’s Supreme Court decided in Jan. 2017 that Parliament must have a say on any Brexit deal. Cameron’s successor, Theresa May, tried to reach a compromise in-out deal, but it was voted down in Parliament three times before she eventually resigned.

– What aspects of Brexit have led to the biggest disagreements?

More than three years after Britain voted for Brexit, in July 2019, Johnson, an idiosyncratic though popular politician who had personally backed Brexit, succeeded May.

He quickly pushed for a new election, in which he won a comfortable majority in Parliament. The new prime minister was able to get his withdrawal agreement through Parliament in January 2020, which resulted in the long-awaited “Brexit Day” on Jan. 31 – when Britain formally Brexited.

In many ways, however, the sense of ending was a mirage: Britain may have negotiated its E.U. departure, but it had yet to reach the more important agreement on its future relationship with the bloc. The country entered into an 11-month transition period in which it could negotiate a future trade deal with Europe.

Many of the problems about future relationship have lingered, unresolved. Even this month, there have been significant arguments over fishing rights and other topics.

The largest debate lingers over the Irish border, across which seamless travel from Northern Ireland to Ireland and vice versa is permitted. If trading rules between Northern Ireland do not align with those of Ireland, an E.U. member state, it could result in the need for a hard border – a potential breach of the Good Friday Agreement that some fear could lead to sectarian violence.

– What is a no-deal Brexit?

Johnson’s government has taken a hard line negotiating style, at one point even suggesting that it would might withdraw from elements of the withdrawal agreement – in potential violation of international law – in a dispute over the Irish border.

The British prime minister has also toyed with the idea of a “no deal” Brexit, under which Britain would leave the E.U. at the end of this year when the transition period ends. Under this scenario, Britain would revert to World Trade Organizations for goods from Europe at its border – a chaotic scenario that could disrupt international trade.

Economists suggest such a scenario would be an economic disaster for Britain, but it would hurt E.U. nations too. In October, Johnson said the country needed to prepare to leave the E.U. without a trade deal with “high hearts and with complete confidence.”

– What long-term effects might Brexit have?

It is hard to say. Britain has struggled economically since the 2016 vote, but the effects of Brexit have been overshadowed by the pandemic. Likewise, Johnson’s ambitious plans for a “Global Britain,” free of E.U. involvement, have sputtered amid a disaster that has killed more than 60,000 people.

Some pro-Brexit voices have argued that short-term economic pain was always likely and that the benefits will come in time. Some British officials have pointed to the country’s speedy approval of the Pfizer vaccine as proof of how the country was held back by European bureaucracy, although critics quickly pointed out that the approval was granted under E.U. rules.

In the years since the Brexit vote, polling agencies have asked the public regularly how it would vote in a second referendum. Most recent polls have revealed a nation divided, with most polls suggesting a small but consistent majority preferring to stay in the E.U. Even as Brexit ends, the debate about it will continue.