President Joe Biden stares down his second State of the Union address with a disappointing report card: a new Washington Post-ABC News poll finds that 62% of Americans think he’s accomplished “not very much” or “little to nothing” in two years on the job.

Tuesday night is his chance to appear before a joint session of Congress and try to convince people otherwise. As of Monday afternoon, the president was still writing and revising his speech with close advisers, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said.

Biden “will have an opportunity to speak directly to the American people, not just Congress, to talk about what he has done over the last two years, and how he sees the future of this country,” she said.

Political scientist Andrew Seligsohn, who leads the nonpartisan research organization Public Agenda, said Biden needs to cover the so-called “bread and butter” issues that matter to most Americans, like the economy. But he also is likely to nibble from the entire smorgasbord of issues, including foreign policy, public health, police reform, gun control and immigration.

“Biden’s challenge in the State of the Union is to make the global case while also presenting himself as a leader who understands and is prepared to meet the day-to-day economic challenges facing Americans here at home,” Seligsohn said in a note to VOA.

It’s the economy, always

Even with last-minute changes, the White House said Biden will definitely devote time to what Americans consistently say is their main concern: their wallets. In that recent poll, 41% of Americans reported that they are worse off financially than when he became president; 42% said they were in the same shape financially as when he took office.

“Two years in, it’s clear — clearer than ever that my economic plan is actually working,” Biden said in January, citing job growth, falling prices and a boost in investments and manufacturing.

On the eve of the speech, his top economic adviser was more measured in his optimism.

“I think the core message is we have to make more progress, but people should feel optimism because of what we have seen and because of the progress that we’ve made, that we know how to keep making progress going forward,” said Brian Deese, National Economic Council director.

Biden is also expected to present his argument to raise the debt ceiling, which is the maximum amount the U.S. Treasury can borrow to pay its bills. The U.S. hit its debt limit of $31.4 trillion in January – Congress now has until midyear to decide to raise the limit before the U.S. defaults.

“I was very clear,” McCarthy said last week, after spending an hour discussing the issue privately with Biden at the White House. “We’re not spending more next year than we spent this year.”

Newly elected Speaker of the House of Representatives Kevin McCarthy, who will be seated behind the president for the duration of the speech, said the Republican Party will continue to oppose what they see as excessive spending.

Tuesday night, Biden will be able to make his case, said David Wessel, who heads the Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy at the Brookings Institution.

“The president will undoubtedly say that he believes that the full faith and credit of the United States should be unquestioned, and he’ll call for a clean increase in the debt ceiling,” Wessel said. “And he probably will say that once we do that, I want to talk about what our spending priorities are. Of course, that won’t go over well with the Republicans.”

Leadership role

Biden also is expected to discuss a range of foreign policy issues, centering on the country that he sees as the United States’ biggest competitor.

“I would fully expect that you’ll hear the president talk about the importance of our leadership on the world stage,” said John Kirby, National Security Council coordinator for strategic communications. “The influence that America has wielded, particularly when it comes to helping Ukraine defend itself against Russia’s invasion and the strategic competition with China.”

On Ukraine, Constanze Stelzenmüller, director of the Center on the United States and Europe at the Brookings Institution, said Biden has a chance to set the tone for how the U.S. and NATO allies are willing to continue their support.

“I think the choice that the allies are staring at – and where I believe neither the administration nor the Europeans really have made up their minds – is whether they ought to pursue a path of prudence, of slow incrementalist turning up the heat, colloquially known as ‘boiling the frog,’ for the sake of avoiding escalation by Putin,” she said. “Or whether they should enable Ukraine to do a big push to prevent a spring offensive by the Russians that might reverse their territorial gains and, conversely, allow Ukraine to retain full control over its territory.”

Gun policy, immigration, health care, police reform and more are also likely to feature in the address.

As is custom, the event will host guests who symbolize some of the issues. The Congressional Black Caucus has invited the parents of slain Memphis resident Tyre Nichols to the address.

Nichols, 29, was killed by five Black police officers in January. Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris have used the tragedy to urge Congress to revisit the stalled police reform act that Democrats proposed after the 2020 killing of Minneapolis resident George Floyd.

And VOA asked Jean-Pierre whether COVID, which Biden mentioned 23 times in last year’s speech, would come up this year.

“Because of the work that this president has done, we are in a different place,” she said. “COVID is not taking over our lives. We’re still fighting COVID. But, again, we’re in a different place.”

2024 presidential run?

William Galston, a governance analyst at the Brookings Institution, said Biden’s speech is about more than policy. As he stands before a joint session of Congress, Biden needs to perform as if he wants another shot at the White House, Galston said.

Biden has repeatedly said he plans to run in 2024, but the 80-year-old has not formally announced his candidacy.

“If you look at the public opinion polls, majorities of Democrats, Republicans and independents think he is too old to do the job,” Galston said. “And one of the really important things that he must convey in this speech is the kind of strength and coherence of delivery that does what can be done to dispel that impression.

“Because, otherwise, it could be a major impediment to his reelection. So the mode of delivery, I think, is more than ordinarily important in this speech,” he said.

Tuesday’s address is at 9 p.m. EST (0200 GMT) in Washington.
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In the latest sign that Donald Trump may have difficulty earning a third consecutive nomination for president by the Republican Party, Americans for Prosperity, a major conservative interest group and source of campaign donations, has announced it will seek to endorse a 2024 candidate other than the former president.    

On Sunday, Emily Seidel, the CEO of Americans for Prosperity (AFP) and a senior adviser to its affiliated political action group, AFP Action, sent a three-page letter to her organization’s staff and the group’s network of activists outlining the organization’s strategy for 2024.    

“[T]o write a new chapter for our country, we need to turn the page on the past,” she wrote. “So the best thing for the country would be to have a president in 2025 who represents a new chapter. The American people have shown that they’re ready to move on, and so AFP will help them do that.”   

Major conservative voice    

Americans for Prosperity was founded in 2004 with the backing of brothers Charles and David Koch, billionaire industrialists with a history of activism in conservative and libertarian politics. Through its affiliated super PAC and with the cooperation of a nationwide network of wealthy activists, the group has channeled hundreds of millions of dollars into U.S. political campaigns since its inception.    

Experts told VOA that having AFP actively campaigning against Trump is bound to pose a challenge for the former president, who announced his candidacy in November but has held few campaign events so far.    

“Americans for Prosperity has been one of, if not the most, influential money groups on the conservative side for the last decade and a half,” Sarah Bryner, director of research and strategy at the Center for Responsive Politics, told VOA.    

“They rank very highly in terms of the amount of money spent overall — and that’s just money that we know about, there’s money being spent that we don’t,” said Bryner, whose organization tracks political spending. “They have a huge network, and they’re bankrolled by some of the most important conservative donors in the country. To have this group — this powerhouse — say, ‘Thanks, but no thanks’ to Donald Trump is a major setback for his campaign.”    

No clear alternative    

Kyle Kondik, the managing editor of Sabato’s Crystal Ball at the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics, told VOA that the decision by AFP is consequential, but that its ultimate impact is not yet clear.    

“I do think this is significant — the Koch apparatus is very well-funded and their support (or opposition) could make a difference in the Republican nominating contest,” Kondik said in an email exchange. “That said, I think it’s fair to say that conservative organizations and political elites were never as supportive of Trump as a lot of Republican voters were, and I can imagine Trump using the opposition of these kinds of groups as an argument for his own candidacy as the campaign heats up.”    

Kondik added, “Ultimately, AFP and others are going to have to coalesce around an actual alternative to Trump — [Florida Governor] Ron DeSantis seems like the most logical person to get that support, but we’re just at the start of the campaign and DeSantis is not yet a candidate. But if conservative elites don’t want Trump to be the nominee — and it’s pretty clear a lot of them don’t — they will need to work to try to stop him. This announcement is an indication that at least some of those groups are going to try to do that.”  

Other conservatives opposing Trump  

In turning aside from Trump, AFP becomes the most recent major Republican donor to signal a lack of enthusiasm for a second Trump presidency, though, as of yet, none has coalesced around an alternative candidate.    

The Club for Growth, an activist group focused on lower taxes and other economic policy matters that has been a force in Republican politics for more than two decades, has signaled that it is also in the market for a new Republican presidential nominee in 2024. Billionaire financiers Stephen A. Schwarzman and Kenneth C. Griffin, both major Republican donors, have also indicated a desire to move on from Trump.    

In the past, however, Trump has demonstrated an ability to overcome the disdain of party elites, using his core of die-hard supporters as a base on which to build a winning primary campaign, as he did in 2016.    

For that reason, some experts wonder how firm the opposition to the former president really is among Republican donors.    

‘A different tune’    

Robert Maguire, research director for Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, told VOA that during the 2016 Republican primary, major donors generally lined up on the side of candidates other than Trump but fell into line once his victory became inevitable.    

“If he is able to do it again, I’d expect them to be singing a different tune [drop their current opposition to him],” Maguire said.    

However, in the meantime, AFP’s announcement is a signal to other potential Republican presidential candidates to begin courting the organization’s endorsement, he said.    

“This demonstrates the degree to which some people, because of the vast wealth that they can pour into elections, get far greater access to powerful politicians than ordinary Americans,” Maguire said.    

Other potential candidates    

So far, Trump is the only one of a number of potential Republican presidential contenders to officially enter the race, though several others seem to be waiting in the wings.    

Some of Trump’s possible rivals are former officials in his administration.  

Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor who served as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations during Trump’s presidency, is expected to announce her candidacy soon. John Bolton, who served as Trump’s national security adviser, has already said that he is considering running.    

Trump’s former vice president, Mike Pence, is also believed to be considering a challenge to the former president. As is Mike Pompeo, who served first as director of the Central Intelligence Agency and later as secretary of state during Trump’s White House years.    

DeSantis, the governor of Florida, is widely considered to be Trump’s most formidable opponent. A popular second-term governor who has won conservative plaudits for his stance as an aggressive culture warrior, DeSantis has yet to officially express interest in the office.    

Some others believed to be considering a run for Republican nomination include Texas Senator Ted Cruz, who lost the nomination to Trump in 2016, and Virginia Governor Glen Youngkin. 
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The Philippines is forging closer military ties with the United States, granting U.S. forces access to an additional four military sites. As VOA’s Chris Casquejo explains, the enhanced partnership comes amid rising concerns over an increasingly aggressive China.

Produced by Chris Casquejo
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China said on Monday that a decision by the United States to shoot down a balloon that had flown into U.S. airspace was a test of Washington’s “sincerity in improving and stabilizing China-U.S. relations and its way of handling crises.”

A U.S. fighter jet shot down the suspected Chinese spy balloon Saturday as it traveled over the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of South Carolina. The balloon’s flight ended after it had traveled for several days across the continental United States.   

Officials in the administration of U.S. President Joe Biden said the balloon was a surveillance aircraft and called its flight over America an “unacceptable violation of our sovereignty” by China.  Officials said the administration took measures to prevent the balloon from gathering any information as it crossed the country.

China is denying those claims, insisting that it was a civilian scientific aircraft that accidentally drifted into U.S. airspace.

In a statement released Sunday, Vice Foreign Minister Xie Feng lodged an official protest to the downing of the balloon, describing it as an overreaction and a “serious violation of international practice.”

Xie vowed that China will “resolutely safeguard the legitimate rights and interests” of the balloon’s private operator.   

The discovery of the balloon prompted U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken to cancel a much-anticipated visit to Beijing designed to improve relations between the two economic giants which have soured in recent years.   

Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning told reporters Monday that Beijing hopes Washington “will work with China to properly handle our differences so as to avoid miscalculation or damage to our mutual trust.”

Some information for this report came from The Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France-Presse. 
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February 6 is the Global Day of Solidarity with Leonard Peltier, a Native American activist who has been imprisoned for almost five decades.

Erika Guevara-Rosas, Americas Director at Amnesty International, said in a statement that “people around the world are calling on President Biden to finally grant Leonard clemency.” She said February 6 “marks the beginning of Leonard’s 48th year of incarceration.”

Peltier, who is 78, has been repeatedly denied parole.

He was a leader in the American Indian Movement when he was arrested, following a shoot out on the Pine Ridge reservation in South Dakota in 1975 in which two FBI agents were killed.

There were several inconsistencies in his case, but he was found guilty and sentenced to two consecutive life sentences.

Before his court case began, he fled the country, fearing that he would not receive a fair trial, but he was found in Canada.

Two other men facing the same charges as Peltier were found not guilty.

“Amnesty International has long maintained that there are serious concerns about the fairness of proceedings leading to his trial and conviction,” Guevara-Rosas said in a statement.

“As President Biden prepares to address the public on Tuesday at the State of the Union Address,” she said, “we urge the administration to uphold their commitment to human rights and grant Leonard Peltier clemency on humanitarian grounds and as a matter of justice.”
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A technology and defense initiative by India and the United States aims at countering China and reducing New Delhi’s dependence on Russian weapons. Analysts say it also marks a significant push in tightening the U.S. and India’s strategic partnership.

Both countries will deepen cooperation in areas like quantum computing, artificial intelligence, 5G wireless networks and semiconductors — areas in which China has acquired a dominating position.

“This convergence comes at a time when technology is becoming a determinant in U.S.-China relations and in some ways the geopolitics of technology is shaping the global balance of power,” said Harsh Pant, the vice president of studies and foreign policy at the Observer Research Foundation in New Delhi. “This also represents America placing a huge bet on India’s emergence as a major player in the Indo-Pacific.”

Senior officials from both countries met in Washington earlier this month for the U.S.-India Initiative on Critical and Emerging Technologies, which was announced by U.S. President Joe Biden and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi last May on the sidelines of a Quad summit held in Tokyo.

Jake Sullivan, the U.S. national security adviser, told reporters that the goal is for technological partnerships to be “the next big milestone” in the India-U.S. relationship.

Concerned about U.S. reliance on China for critical components such as semiconductors, Washington has taken steps to halt the sale of advanced semiconductor technology to Beijing and wants to shift the manufacture of such components to friendly countries.

India, whose relations with Beijing have plummeted since a deadly clash along their Himalayan border three years ago, also wants to boost local manufacturing in crucial sectors such as semiconductors which are at the heart of modern electronic devices.

“Geopolitics is a big driver of this new initiative,” said Michael Kugelman, director of the South Asia Institute at the Wilson Center. He says the agreement reflects how far the India-U.S. relationship has come over the last few decades. “In recent years they’ve built enough trust to be talking about technology transfers and intelligence-sharing—something that Washington tends to do only with its closest strategic partners.”

The agreement also aims to facilitate joint development of defense technologies and weapons production in India. New Delhi wants to coproduce weapons in India with foreign defense manufacturers rather than purchase them outright, but U.S. restrictions on transferring defense technology have stalled such efforts with American companies.

The initial focus will be on jet engines, artillery systems and armored infantry vehicles. During the February 1 meeting in Washington, American officials said that the government would look into expediting a review of an application by U.S. manufacturer General Electric to jointly build jet engines in India for Indian aircraft.

“The more India and the U.S. will work on cutting edge technologies, the less relevant Russia will become to India’s strategic calculations,” Pant said.

India’s partnership with Washington has been spurred by New Delhi’s growing worries about China as troops from both countries faceoff along their disputed Himalayan border for a third winter. However, India did not join in Western sanctions against Russia or outright condemn the Russian invasion of Ukraine, raising questions about the divergent position it took from the U.S.

Analysts in India pointed out that besides its longstanding policy of strategic autonomy, New Delhi’s choices were also constrained by its heavy dependence on Russia for weapons. Although India has diversified its defense purchases in recent years, more than two thirds of its military equipment is of Russian origin and critical to its security needs amid its standoff with China.

“Washington’s current policy is to play a long game and to try to persuade New Delhi that over the longer term, Moscow will be too cash-strapped and sanctioned to provide military supplies to India,” Kugelman said. “And that the U.S. will position itself to provide India with the types of military equipment that New Delhi has long secured from Russia.”

However, translating the potential of the defense and technology agreements on the ground remains to be tested because much will depend on how private companies in both countries move to firm up partnerships. While India has a highly skilled workforce, American companies have long complained of Indian regulations that have been an obstacle to manufacturing in the country. India on the other hand cites strict U.S. regulations on technology transfers as hampering those efforts.

But the agreement is seen as a positive signal of the two countries overcoming long-standing issues of trust.

“Despite India’s stand on Ukraine, despite some other problems, these have become marginal to the larger strategic vision that the two nations have. It is now guided by the Indo-Pacific, where they are increasingly on the same side,” Pant said.
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