WASHINGTON (AP) – President Joe Biden faces two critical tests to see if the deadly riot at the U.S. Capitol has damaged America’s status as a beacon for democracy.
Demonstrations in Russia and a military coup in Myanmar comes as American credibility on the world stage collapsed after a Capitol storm last month by a pro-Donald Trump mob seeking certification of Biden’s election victory.
This adds to Biden’s weight because he wants to make a promise to dramatically reposition the US as a world leader after four years of a Trump foreign policy driven by an ‘America First’ mantra. This policy has been marked by the frequent contempt of democratic allies and the occasional embrace of authoritarian leaders.
Biden’s top diplomat, Antony Blinken, acknowledged the difficulty.
‘I think there is no doubt that the attack on our own democracy on 6 January poses a greater challenge for us to carry the banner of democracy and freedom and human rights around the world, because people in other countries are definitely telling us: “Well, why do not you even look at yourselves?” ‘, the Secretary of State said in an interview with NBC News.
Blinken added: “The difference between us and so many other countries, however, is that when we are challenged, even when we challenge ourselves, we do so in full transparency in daylight.”
In the early days of his presidency, Biden tried to send the message in a series of calls with foreign leaders that America was back.
He reassures Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga that the US has their support in an ongoing territorial dispute with China over islands in the East China Sea. He tried to restore relations with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, which was belittled by Trump as ‘dishonest and weak’. And he told Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador that the US would send $ 4 billion to assist development in Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala – countries whose hardships have caused tidal migration through Mexico to the United States.
“The United States remains a country in the world looking for leadership,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters. “It’s going to take a while, but he’s definitely committed to it.”
But the crises in Myanmar and Russia offer Biden difficult tests of his promise to restore global leadership that is likely to be far more complex than repairing fences with traditional allies.
Biden on Monday threatened to drop new sanctions against Myanmar after a coup in which the military arrested the civilian leaders of its government and called the episode “a direct attack on the country’s transition to democracy and the rule of law.”
In his first call with Russian President Vladimir Putin as peers last week, Biden expressed concern over the detention of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny and the repression of supporters supporting his arrest. The mass arrests have only accelerated in the days since the two leaders spoke as protest rallies continued across the country.
“For Putin, he looks at the uprising in the Capitol and sees it as more evidence of his worldview, a continuation of the decline of liberalism in the world,” said Michael McFaul, who served as US ambassador to Russia in the Obama administration , said. ‘The Biden election does not mean much to him about his theory of liberal democracy. While Putin’s opponents are much encouraged by the election of President Biden, because it shows that American democratic institutions were resilient. ”
For that, Navalny’s supporters wrote to Biden over the weekend, urging him to act sensibly with sanctions against members of Putin’s inner circle to show that he is serious about regaining the US role as a champion of democracy.
“Their argument is: if you just sanction a bunch of low-level colonels with no name, that’s exactly what Putin expects,” McFaul said. “They want the Biden government to sanction the economic players in the Putin regime, and they made it easy for the Biden government because they named them all in their seven-page letter.”
Rep. Adam Schiff, a California Democrat and chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, drew a line from Trump to the coup in Myanmar. Trump has made unfounded accusations of widespread voter fraud that has been rejected by several courts as well as Trump’s own Justice Department.
An announcement read on Myanmar’s military Myawaddy TV stated that the seizure was necessary because the government did not respond to the army’s unproven allegations in the country’s recent election in Southeast Asia, and because it may allow the election to proceed despite the coronavirus pandemic.
“When America speaks and acts, watches the world, and when our leaders propagate conspiracy theories and undermine democracy here at home, it sets a dangerous example for the rest of the world,” Schiff said.
Opponents such as China, Iran and Venezuela cited the Capitol riot as evidence of the fragility of American democracy. Even some allies have said the scene is disturbing and that they have reconsidered the position of the United States as the self-proclaimed beacon of democracy.
“After something like this, I believe it would be very difficult for the world to see the United States as a symbol of democracy,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelinskiy said in an interview with Axios on HBO.
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Associated Press author Darlene Superville contributed to this report.