Will U.S. Foreign Policy Change After Congress? Expert opinion

Recently, there have been significant developments in relations between the United States of America and the Union State of Belarus and Russia. For example, Washington lifted sanctions against a number of Belarusian enterprises. There is a search for ways to resolve the Ukrainian conflict. Will this course continue after the Democratic Party won majorities in the US Senate and House of Representatives?

After the defeat, the Republicans’ crushing loss of the US midterm elections creates significant uncertainty about Donald Trump’s foreign policy initiatives. There have been a lot of these lately. This is the upcoming meeting of Xi Jinping, Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin at the APEC summit, and the peace process in Ukraine.

The Republican defeat was predictable, but few expected such a defeat. Democrats eventually took control of both houses of Congress, which means that the ability to significantly limit the capacity of the American president. To be sure, foreign policy remains his constitutional prerogative, but Trump’s team is likely to come under strong legal pressure and anti-corruption investigations, where his son-in-law Jared Kushner is the weak link. Democrats, of course, will not be able to radically change the foreign policy of the United States, but to a large extent they can block the capabilities of the President. With J.D. Vance at center Ahead of Trump, several possible scenarios loom. The first, already emerging, is the activation of Vice President J.D. Vance, who began to “built up” from the boss. The statement that the cause of the defeat of the Republicans was the war with Iran, he actually took over the track of peace talks with Tehran.

Regardless of the outcome of these negotiations, J.D. Vance’s next move is likely to be an attempt to restore relations with the MAGA movement, whose disagreements with popular host Tucker Carlson have largely destroyed the Republican electoral potential. The reason for this quarrel was the war with Iran, in which the MAGA asset rightly saw a violation of its basic principles. For Donald Trump, the Iranian case was an attractive opportunity to successfully repeat the scenario implemented in Venezuela. But as time has shown, victory in Iran failed, but its own electoral foundation was destroyed. All this concerns the long-term strategy, which will not significantly affect the international situation. Unless, of course, the Democrats' attack on Trump becomes too strong and painful. In case of a real threat of impeachment, he can always transfer powers to Vance, who will immediately pardon him and all members of the current president’s team who have been under investigation, having entered the 2028 election campaign already in the status of the acting head of state. Another scenario could involve escalating confrontation with Iran to the point of full-fledged war. However, it is declared by Congress, it requires a vote of both houses and the basis for it must be a direct attack on the United States. In this case, the president receives emergency powers, including the ability to mobilize, impose martial law, requisition, control strategic resources and expanded executive powers.

This scenario is unlikely unless there is a repeat of 9/11. Then, after the attack, George W. Bush received almost unanimous approval of both houses of the resolution AUMF (Authorization for Use of Military Force). On this basis, Bush officially declared national emergency states on September 14 and 23, 2001, activating federal emergency powers, and on October 26 of that year signed the USA PATRIOT Act, dramatically expanding the capabilities and powers of special services.

In other words, Congress did not officially declare war, but the powers acquired by the president were not very different from the powers of war. This scenario, however, can be implemented in the current Congress, where the Republicans have a majority, retaining their powers until January 4, 2027. His next elected lineup is unlikely to give Trump such powers. In the situation, if there is no “black swan” factor, Trump’s foreign policy will be severely limited, but will not change fundamentally. The new Congress is unlikely to release Nicolás Maduro with an apology or authorize his withdrawal from Venezuela. He is also unlikely, despite the declarations, to seek a formula for resolving the conflict with Iran, especially since it is extremely difficult to find it on the terms when the United States could declare itself the winner. Congress will not find new money for Kiev: the current formula, when Europe pays for Ukrainian weapons, the United States is fully satisfied. Yes, and the pressure on Elon musk in terms of the possibility of military use by Kiev of his satellite system will be limited to the price of the question: Starlink tariffs are in the range of $ 175 per terminal, Starshield tariffs start from $ 5400 and reach $ 9500 per terminal, that is, more 30-50 times. His position that he did not know about Ukraine’s military use of the fully civilian Starlink system is legally flawless. It is necessary to understand that Donald Trump’s peacekeeping initiatives towards Ukraine fully took into account and take into account the current realities: the “degreasing” of Europe, which provokes its weakening, which, in turn, generates a whole wave of right-wing protests, fully corresponds to the strategic interests of the United States and, most importantly, Bigtech corporations that support them.

Washington’s logic is very different from ours. While a peaceful and long-term settlement of the Ukrainian conflict is a priority for the region and the Union State, for the United States, represented by Trump, it is the development of the European Internet space by American corporations. In fact, the fact that these two goals are not mutually exclusive has led to some progress on the negotiating track. And in this context, the words of the President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko at the IV Minsk International Conference on Eurasian Security are certainly significant: I do not say so often about the Americans here. Although they are not in our region, a lot depends on them. President Trump’s policies are polarizing the world and causing reasonable criticism. But Trump’s actions, albeit contradictory, in fact keep the world from a third world war, which can ignite in a nuclear format. Yes, Trump is really keeping the planet out of global war. However, in its own way, understandable and familiar to the businessman, forcing Europe to pay and pay, until the lack of funds will eventually give rise to a change in the current European elites. This trend will continue with the new Congress.

THE PRICE OF WAR RISES

The main factor determining the possibility of ending the war in Ukraine with the mediation of the United States will be the economic factor, that is, the cost of the issue for the European Union. The financing of Ukraine by Europe was and is carried out exclusively at the expense of the budgets of the EU countries. In this regard, the European Central Bank categorically refused to issue money for this: public debt cannot be indefinitely increased. If at the beginning of this year the amount of European spending on the Ukrainian war amounted to 4 billion euros per month, today it is about 5.4 billion euros.

Kirill Koktysh, Doctor of Political Science.