The 2020 US Elections and the Philippines
Note: All polling averages are taken from fivethirtyeight.com at the date of publication.
For most Filipino observers, US elections are nothing more than a distant spectacle. But the outcome of the current Trump-Biden battle is more than a signifier of American state of affairs; it is another milestone in a global landscape so quickly changing, the consequences of which do not spare the Philippines nor its political realities. So where are we in this race, and where is us in this race?
Most Signs Pointing Blue
Barring any last-second surprises, it appears that the question for the 2020 US Presidential Election happening this November 3rd is not whether Donald Trump will lose, but by how much. Not only is Joe Biden outperforming 2016 Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton in most solid to lean Democratic states, projections say he is poised to win the Rust Belt states of Michigan (+8), Pennsylvania (+6.3), and Wisconsin (+7.3) — forty-six electoral votes all won by Trump four years ago, all with a statewide margin of less than 1%.
Biden seems to be similarly favored in other states won by Trump in 2016. Florida, which counts for a humongous 29 electoral votes, is heavily contested, too. While Biden polled as high as +7 in late July, recent numbers show the race has been tightening up in the last weeks. Same trend can be seen in Arizona, where Democrats have only won once (ONCE!) since 1952.
But the more serious problem for the President is not just that he had to regain ground in states he won in 2016; it’s that states he won convincingly then are suddenly competitive in 2020. Trump is currently +1.2 in Texas, a state he won by nine points four years ago. Races are competitive in the usually-red states of Georgia (Biden +0.8) and Iowa (Biden +0.1) too. No serious forecast would count out Trump in these states, surely, especially given these states’ voting history, but the mere competitiveness of these races forces the President’s campaign to play defense and pour resources into what should have been certainties in the red column.
Congressional races pose more bad news for the Republicans. After winning back the House majority in 2018, Democrats are almost certain to retain control of the lower chamber this November 3rd. But the Senate is a different blow — Republicans currently hold a 53–47 majority which they are statistically sure to lose. Democratic candidates in Colorado (John Hickenlooper), Arizona (Mark Kelly), Maine (Sara Gideon), Iowa (Theresa Greenfield), and North Carolina (Cal Cunningham) are all very likely to win against Republican incumbents, while those in Montana (Steve Bullock), South Carolina (Jamie Harrison), and Georgia (Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock) are all in very competitive races. Even if the GOP is to flip Doug Jones’s seat in Alabama, Democrats have positioned themselves to get at least the four seats they need to win the Senate majority, if Biden wins the presidency (Note: in the US, the vice-president presides over the Senate and casts the tie-breaking vote).
This means Democrats are likely to gain control of the White House, the House of Representatives, and the Senate for the first time since 2008, but this does not point to a 1964-like landslide by any means. In fact, the President’s conservative base had shown very little signs of shrinking — his approvals have rarely moved from the usual low-40s, and his polling strength still stem from the same white, non-college educated electoral segments that catapulted him into power. Yet he has been losing ground in white suburban women and seniors, and has never had a chance to win over the youth and African-American voters. In short, his base is simply too small to win a deeply polarized America, and his rhetoric is simply too divisive to expand it. His abysmal handling of the coronavirus pandemic and poor response to the George Floyd protests did not help either, as they seemed to have energized Democrats and united them behind an otherwise uncharismatic presidential nominee, and it shows: Democrats outraised their Republican counterparts five dollars to one.
What’s next for America? Due to millions of voters voting by mail, Donald Trump will almost certainly contest the result of the election, so the race is unlikely to be called on the night of November 3rd. The chances of him pulling another upset looms too. But presuming the mathematically likely, Republicans are due for a soul-searching; an intraparty power contest can be expected to ensue — shall they continue down the path laid by Trump and find his political heir (and perhaps undermine a Democratic government by all means necessary), or shall they react sharply to the defeat and return to their moderate patrician roots that had alienated American conservatives for quite a while? On the other hand, a Joe Biden presidency would, in the short-term, face the daunting task of uniting a country where middle ground appears to be an ancient concept, and ultimately, lead the de-Trumpification of America. To do that, he has to utilize the fresh mandate of his party and pass common sense reforms in health care (including the management of COVID), economy, race relations, and international stature, but the challenge will outlast his first four years in office.
What’s in it for the Philippines?
Whatever the result of the election and however the next four years will turn out will change the current state of world geopolitics. Both Trump and Biden are strong supporters of expanding US military power, yet the former is less likely to resort to interventionism. Trump’s international politics has been centered on advancing American interests by: (1) second-thinking disadvantageous conventional commitments, as seen in his withdrawal from the TPP, the WHO, the JCPOA, and his expression of demands to NATO, and (2) extracting capital by forging unlikely alliances, such as with North Korea, Russia, and even the Taliban. Biden is more America-as-we-know-it: he values ties with European powers and strategic players in the Asia-Pacific, in spite of the fiscal and political toll they take domestically. The reasoning behind it is simple: America cannot afford to be isolated, for its military, political, and economic interests can only be achieved with its allies.
Interestingly, neither Donald Trump nor his Filipino counterpart Rodrigo Duterte has expressed any significant intent to abandon US-Philippine commitments. In spite of Duterte’s very public pivot towards China and strong words against American aggression in the past, he and Trump have always been mutually respectful and admiring. While Duterte has long been accused of waiving the country’s claims against disputed territories in the West Philippine Sea in favor of financial and political backing from Beijing, there has been a slight shift of rhetoric in the recent months from the Philippine government. For example, Duterte signified to the United Nations his intention to assert the 2016 ruling of the Permanent Court of Arbitration (which belied Chinese claims in the region) last September, and Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin has also since then stiffed the country’s stance of asserting its claims over the area.
This is a curious shift, but it plays very well with Trump’s corresponding anti-China stance. Naturally, American view on China is unfavorable, particularly at a point when it is still reeling from the effects of a global pandemic that originated in China. Trump has framed himself as the anti-China candidate, and has also raised legitimate questions on Biden’s ties with the Chinese government. While that is very unlikely to reverse the expected outcome of their election, the sudden acceleration of anti-China rhetoric is enough for the Philippines to gravitate slightly towards America. US State Department recently disclosed that Secretary Mike Pompeo spoke with Locsin to discuss “the recent change in US policy on maritime claims in the South China Sea.” Duterte has also very recently pardoned a US marine convicted of murder by Philippine courts. Yet this flipflopping by the Philippine government has almost no domestic political consequence; in fact, a 2019 research reveals a plurality of Filipinos maintain a favorable view of both Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping, a share of the public second only to Kenya.
A Biden win, meanwhile, puts all of those recent developments into question. With Biden determined to rekindle American alliances in the North Atlantic, we can expect his administration to be less tolerant of Duterte’s undemocratic actions and policies. This is very, very unlikely to be more than talk, though, let alone to take the form of sanctions; Biden will still see value in the Philippines as a historical and strategic military and economic partner, and continuing that partnership will be essential not only in bolstering American presence in the Asia-Pacific, but in balancing his unconfrontational stance on China. There will be no point in compromising Biden’s pro-ally message and at the same time risking alienating Duterte, whose political corner is, as things stand, not expected to lose or relinquish power even after the Philippines have its own national elections in 2022. Due to his administration’s inconsistent stance on Chinese aggression, Duterte is not in a position to kowtow to the United States for safety and defense either, and may very well repivot to his non-Allied friends if provoked. Beyond the Philippines, this presents a dilemma all too real for Biden: while he may still have his signature imprint on US international relations, he will at the same time have to scramble to prevent the cataclysmic effects of the isolationist and ultra-realist tendencies of nations post-Trump, and he may have to compromise parts of his message and forget appeasing portions of his voter base in effect. For these reasons, critics of Duterte smiling at the prospect of a Biden presidency as a progressive international ally are advised to not hold their breaths.
In political economic terms, Biden adopts an America first policy similar to Trump’s in rhetoric, but differing in approach. The former vice-president sees little value in Trump’s antagonizing trade wars and crusades for better trade deals. Instead, Biden promises to invest in American industries and create new jobs domestically by promoting clean energy. This poses a very negligible threat to the millions of jobs outsourced to the Filipino labor market, but Biden’s interesting quasi-nationalist take on world trade is still one to watch.
If the Philippines is to gain anything from a power transfer in the United States, this will be in view of less volatility in international affairs and in a slight de-escalation in some areas of conflict. True to the central message of his campaign, Biden is a candidate of normalcy. He is a refuge for everyone tired of the blabbering, TV-obsessed, division-stoking Trump’s America. Biden represents the America of the recent past — congenial yet self-interested, peace-loving yet aggressive, generous yet unabashedly capitalist. Should the polling math hold up in reality, then for Americans, that America is good enough, for now. And while a “normal” America is not necessarily good for the Philippines, we might have to make do with the kind of change they decide through their ballots, at least until we have better prospects of creating change through our own.
