When news networks called the presidential election for former Vice President Joe Biden on Nov. 7, many Americans started receiving texts, emails and social media posts from relieved colleagues across the globe.
“You’re back on track,” said Hammad Sarfraz, a journalist friend who called me from Pakistan that day to convey his excitement. “Many around the world admire the freedoms and democracy that you enjoy in America. I am so happy. We need a very stable, strong America. The world needs a good cop. There are problems in America, but there is so much good in America.”
“I am so glad,” wrote another friend, from the Czech Republic. “Wonderful,” she commented on my Facebook feed. “I am so glad, even here many feel a great relief and a breath of fresh air.”
The world is waiting for America to get on with its government transition after what many abroad see as the most consequential election not just for the U.S. but for other nations. They are as horrified as many voters here at the morally bankrupt campaign by a sitting U.S. president to deny, delay and thwart American democracy.
President Donald Trump’s baseless charges of vote fraud by Democrats, his flurry of evidence-free lawsuits and failure to recognize Biden’s presumed Electoral College victory are by no means a coup attempt, not yet anyway. But Biden was right to call this “an embarrassment.” That’s an understatement.
Besides the obvious damage Trump and his acolytes are doing to the legitimacy and credibility of U.S. elections every day, a real danger is the lasting damage the petulant president and his GOP enablers are doing to America’s reputation and leadership role in the world.
Whatever missteps the United States has made in foreign policy through history, from helping stage coups in some nations to waging misguided wars in others, this country has long championed democracy, human rights and freedom around the globe. More often than not, our better angels get it right, and the world follows.
Veterans Day was a strong reminder that during World War II, for example, U.S. troops literally helped save the free world from tyranny. America then led the rebuilding of Europe, Germany and Japan based on respect for freedom and self-determination, while constructing a more globally intertwined economic system in the postwar decades.
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For his part, Trump has proven capricious and contentious in foreign affairs while questioning the value to the U.S. of NATO, the United Nations and other global institutions. He has achieved real progress in North America revising the free trade agreement, and in the Middle East brokering economic cooperation deals between Israel and Arab states, but he has had mixed results working for breakthroughs on trade with China and the denuclearization of North Korea.
Everywhere, now, foreign governments are watching and waiting to see how this U.S. drama plays out, mostly hoping for a return to a more reliable, stable and consistent American administration. They welcome Biden’s pledges to restore America’s standing, global cooperation and long-held norms in U.S. diplomacy.
Leaders of America’s strongest allies, from Europe to Asia, have already called and congratulated the presumptive president-elect and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris, while U.S. rivals such as Russia are holding off recognition, pending Trump’s legal challenges. State-controlled media in Russia have crowed that the presidential election is evidence of Moscow’s view that U.S. democracy is chaotic, unstable and easily manipulated.
As COVID-19 cases hit record highs in the U.S. and surge around the world, American leadership and global cooperation to defeat the virus could hardly seem more essential. Yet, Trump’s “America first” policies have left U.S. collaboration with many global institutions diminished, and he has decided to withdraw the U.S. from the World Health Organization at a time when it is perhaps most needed.
Trump’s tenure on the global stage has been widely criticized for denigrating U.S. allies and alliances and pulling out of international commitments, such as the 2016 Paris Agreement on climate change and the 2015 Iran nuclear deal. At the same time he has coddled dictators such as Russia’s Vladimir Putin and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un.
The White House has even obstructed the normal transition traditions and obligations, such as giving Biden access to the president’s daily briefing from the intelligence community as well as to funding and office space normally given to the incoming president’s team to help smooth an orderly transition.
America used to be the world’s model and a beacon for other nations. Now an American president and his GOP supporters are working hard to try to stop the counting of every vote in this country.
Every politician has a right to a recount if there are legitimate concerns about vote fraud, but they don’t get to make them up. This shameful conduct is par for the course for Trump, a leader who remains in denial and has shown little but contempt for America’s values, democratic traditions and electoral norms.
Let’s honor our nation, our history, our people and our veterans by continuing the honest and hard work for a more perfect union. This is far beyond Republicans or Democrats. It’s about the country. The voters have spoken. The world is watching.
Storer H. Rowley, a former foreign correspondent and national editor for the baiduhai, is an adjunct lecturer in journalism and communication at Northwestern University.
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