Daily News Brief

November 5, 2024

Top of the Agenda

Americans head to the polls today after a roller-coaster presidential campaign that has included two assassination attempts, a major party candidate swap, aggressive efforts at foreign interference, and intense attention from around the world. Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump both delivered closing messages yesterday in the pivotal state of Pennsylvania, with Harris repeating her messages on economic safeguards and protecting abortion rights while Trump floated a new proposal for tariffs on Mexico and China and condemned illegal immigration. The candidates have divergent views on major foreign policy issues, including climate change, immigration, and the Russia-Ukraine war.

Vote counting is expected to unfold this evening at varying speeds—and facing varying challenges—across the states in what polling experts are calling one of the closest elections in U.S. history. Pennsylvania election officials are grappling with a last-minute effort to disqualify some 4,000 mail-in ballots, the latest in a string of legal challenges that experts say could extend beyond the election. Meanwhile, three U.S. intelligence agencies warned yesterday that Iran and Russia would most likely flood social media with misinformation on election day and in the following weeks. The U.S. cybersecurity leader yesterday said that despite the disinformation surge, she has not seen evidence of activity that would directly affect the outcome of the vote. (NYT, WaPo, NPR, Reuters)

Analysis

“Precisely because of state powers, it is actually much harder for any candidate or party to steal a presidential election,” the University of Michigan’s Jenna Bednar and the Carnegie Endowment’s Mariano-Florentino Cuéllar write for Foreign Affairs. “As a crucial feature of U.S. democracy, this latent capacity could help constrain reckless attempts to undermine the mechanics of the election and the peaceful transfer of power.” 

“In one of the most consequential elections in U.S. history, information researchers and fact checkers whose work proved crucial to identifying false information during the 2020 U.S. campaign have been under attack,” Freedom House’s Allie Funk, Kian Vesteinsson, and Grant Baker write for the Net Politics blog. “This chilling effect on information research is not an aberration. In a recently released report, Freedom House documented similar attacks across the globe that seek to delegitimize the work of independent researchers and fact-checkers, spelling serious consequences for democracy in the digital age.”

Check out CFR’s full suite of election-related resources.

Europe

The four detainees were part of an effort to test run transfers of incendiary packages that would ultimately be sent to the United States and Canada, Poland’s prosecutor’s office said. Its foreign intelligence agency head said Russian spies were to blame. Investigations began after packages ignited at DHL logistics hubs in Germany and the United Kingdom (UK) earlier this year. A Kremlin spokesperson said Russian involvement was “unsubstantiated.” (WSJ)

North Korea/Russia: Ukraine’s military said yesterday it fought with North Korean troops in Russia’s Kursk region. While the U.S. Defense Department said it could not immediately corroborate reports that North Korean troops had engaged in combat, Group of Seven (G7) countries as well as Australia, New Zealand, and South Korea said today that they condemned the increased military cooperation between Russia and North Korea “in the strongest possible terms” and would coordinate a response. (Bloomberg, Reuters)

CFR’s Liana Fix and Benjamin Harris outline why this marks a dangerous new phase in the war.

Pacific Rim

Premier Li Qiang said at a business expo in Shanghai that China will “further open up” its market and import more goods from trading partners as part of efforts to address lagging growth. Starting next month, China will eliminate tariffs from trade with forty-three countries the United Nations classifies as “least developed,” most of which are in Africa. (SCMP)  

For the China Strategy Initiative, CFR’s Nathan Schoonover gives an October roundup of China’s activities across Africa. 

Cambodia/Thailand: Thailand will push to restart talks with Cambodia over joint exploration of petroleum reserves thought to be worth some $300 billion, Thai Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra said. Any potential exploration has been stalled by a decades-long territorial dispute over the offshore area off the Gulf of Thailand. (Bloomberg) 

South and Central Asia

Kazakhstan’s president wrapped up a state visit in Paris today during which it agreed on $2.2 billion worth of deals with France, the Kazakh Invest National Company’s press service said. Meanwhile Kazakhstan’s prime minister in Shanghai yesterday inked another $2.5 billion of deals with Chinese firms. Kazakhstan is one of the Central Asian states that in recent years has tried to diversify its trade relations to reduce reliance on Russia. (The Astana Times, RFE/RL)

Pakistan: The legislature fast-tracked the approval of a legislative package yesterday that extended the tenure of top military officials as it endures a spike in militant violence. Pakistan’s army chief had been set to retire late next year but he will now be in office for five years instead of three. The powerful military has governed Pakistan for around half of its seventy-two-year history. (Dawn, Bloomberg) 

Middle East and North Africa

A rare transfer out of the Gaza Strip will tomorrow move patients including children with trauma injuries and chronic diseases, a World Health Organization (WHO) official said. Twelve thousand people in total are awaiting transfer. Yesterday, Israeli shelling damaged an already struggling major hospital in Northern Gaza, its director said. Israel’s military said it was looking into reports coming from the hospital. (Reuters, NYT)

For Think Global Health, Mustafa Al-Bayati and Natasha Ross offer a frontline look at Gaza’s health system. 

Qatar: The country is holding a snap vote today on whether to end its limited elections for legislative office. Analysts say the change is expected to pass. The short-lived policy of holding elections for Qatar’s legislature was implemented as the country prepared to host the 2022 soccer World Cup and came under increased international scrutiny. (AP)  

Sub-Saharan Africa

On his first official trip to the continent, UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy visited Abuja and signed a framework deal with Nigerian President Bola Tinubu for the countries to elevate their economic and security relations. It establishes a bilateral commission that will also discuss climate action and people-to-people ties. (Vanguard, Punch) 

Nigerian Foreign Minister Yusuf Tuggar joined CFR for a conversation on the country’s foreign policy aims. 

U.S./Kenya: A Manhattan jury yesterday convicted Kenyan man Cholo Abdi Abdullah of plotting to slam an airplane into a U.S. building on behalf of terrorist group al-Shabaab. Abdullah was arrested in 2019 while doing pilot training in the Philippines. (AP)

Americas

The proposed cap would come into effect in four years and limit greenhouse gas emissions in the sector to 35 percent below 2019 levels. The final rule is expected to be published in the spring of 2025. The premier of the oil-rich Alberta province said the plan was harmful to the economy and vowed to fight it, while federal officials said the sector was expected to grow 16 percent above 2019 levels by 2030–32 with the cap in place. (CBC) 

Canadian Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland speaks at CFR about Canada’s positions on economy, energy, democracy, and more.

Mexico: The country’s Supreme Court is expected to vote today on a proposal to invalidate part of a recent overhaul of the judicial system. The court’s move puts it further into conflict with Congress and the presidency, which support the reform. (Reuters)

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