Daily News Brief

November 13, 2024

Top of the Agenda

U.S. President Joe Biden and President-Elect Donald Trump will hold their first post-election meeting today against a backdrop of a flurry of Trump staff nominations. Such talks are typical of presidential transitions, but Trump chose not to host Biden for them after the 2020 election. Trump is also expected to meet with Republican legislators and House leadership while in Washington. His visit comes as the Republican-majority Senate is holding a leadership vote today.

Trump’s latest nominees for top administration positions include Florida Representative Michael Waltz as National Security Advisor and veteran and Fox News host Pete Hegseth for Secretary of Defense. He also announced picks for the head of the Central Intelligence Agency, the U.S. ambassador to Israel, the head of the Department of Homeland Security, and chief White House counsel. Businessmen Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy will head a new advisory body, the Department of Government Efficiency, designed to cut “wasteful” programs and expenditures, Trump said in a statement. He did not give further details on how the new department would be structured. (Reuters, CBS, NYT)

Analysis

“[In a presidential transition] you try to have some idea of what the administration is going to be pursuing in its opening days and weeks. In fact, the [National Security Council] I think is very typical to try to script the president's first day, first week, first month, and first ninety days. What [is] the president going to do in order to set the tone for the new administration and make it clear to the American people that the new president is going to make good on the things that were set out during the presidential campaign?” former Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs Stephen J. Hadley tells The President’s Inbox.

“Making Trump’s presidency successful does not mean simply adopting his ideas wholesale. Any new administration needs to square its sweeping campaign rhetoric with the realities of market behavior, fiscal constraints, and the actions of U.S. adversaries,” the American Enterprise Institute’s Kori Schake writes for Foreign Affairs.

Pacific Rim

The Pacific Island nation reelected President Surangel Whipps Jr. this week. Yesterday, he said that Chinese ships were traveling “uninvited” within Palau’s exclusive economic zone and that Chinese officials earlier this year bestowed names on two underwater mountains belonging to Palau. Palau is one of the few countries that diplomatically recognizes Taiwan. (AFP)

This Backgrounder by Lindsay Maizland looks at why China-Taiwan relations are so tense.

China: A man plowed an SUV into a crowd at a sports station, killing thirty-five people in what is the deadliest in a string of violent attacks in recent months. In a rare public reaction, President Xi Jinping called for authorities across the country to “strictly prevent extreme incidents” and ensure social stability. (SCMP, WSJ)

South and Central Asia

Armenia accuses Azerbaijan of forcing ethnic Armenians to leave the enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh, while Azerbaijan accuses Armenia of laying landmines and booby traps. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled both competing cases can proceed but limited the scope of Azerbaijan’s case. (Reuters)

At this CFR event, experts discuss conflict resolution between Armenia and Azerbaijan. 

India: The country’s top court ruled that government authorities cannot demolish the property of people accused of a crime without allowing for judicial due process. Many state governments have carried out so-called “bulldozer justice” in recent years. (Times of India)

Middle East and North Africa

Eight aid organizations declared yesterday that Israel did not meet the United States’ demands on allowing more aid into the Gaza Strip within a U.S.-imposed thirty-day deadline. A State Department spokesperson, however, said Washington does not assess that Israel is in violation of U.S. law and will not change its policy toward Israel for the time being. He added that “we’ve seen some progress being made.” (CNN)

U.S./Iraq: A U.S. jury found U.S. government contractor CACI International liable for torture committed at the Abu Ghraib detention center near Baghdad in 2003–2004 and said it must pay $42 million in damages. It was the first time a civilian contractor was held legally responsible for torture at the detention center. (Reuters)

Sub-Saharan Africa

At least 124 civilians have been killed in Sudan’s El Gezira state since October 20, the United Nations tallied. UN peacebuilding official Rosemary DiCarlo told the Security Council yesterday that both sides “seem convinced they can prevail on the battlefield,” while analysts from Human Rights Watch and the Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies said no political solution appeared to be on the horizon. (AFP) 

Somaliland: The breakaway region of Somaliland is holding its fourth presidential election today. The government delayed the election from its original date of 2022, citing political and economic struggles. Nearly thirty international observers are watching the vote at which more than a million people are expected to cast their ballots. (AP)

CFR’s Mariel Ferragamo covers Somaliland’s long fight for independence. 

Europe

German lawmakers will hold a confidence vote on Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s government on December 16, after his three-party coalition collapsed last week. If Scholz loses and the president calls a new election, political parties agree it should be held on February 23. It’s unlikely the government would pass a 2025 budget before the snap election, the finance minister said, while the upheaval creates a period of uncertainty around German foreign policymaking. (DW)

CFR’s Liana Fix and Sophia Winograd look at how far-right gains in Germany are altering Europe’s political landscape.

England: The head of the Church of England, Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, resigned after a report found he failed to seek a proper investigation into allegations of widespread abuse at Christian summer camps in the 1970s and 1980s. (NYT)

Americas

The detained man was the top security official in the city of Chilpancingo, an unnamed government source told Reuters. Chilpancingo’s mayor was killed in October just days after taking office. (Reuters)

Argentina: Monthly inflation in October fell to a three-year low of 2.7 percent under the economic reforms of libertarian President Javier Milei. His government had promised to bring inflation below 3 percent before the end of the year. (AP)

COP29

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency officials announced the first-ever national fee of its kind in Baku; it includes a levy for wasting methane over a certain threshold and incentives for companies to repair leaky pipes. Speaking at the climate summit, ExxonMobil CEO Darren Woods said the Trump administration should not scrap U.S. methane regulations or pull out from the Paris climate agreement, arguing such a move would create uncertainty and frustrate efforts to address climate change. (WaPo, CNN, Semafor, WSJ) 

In this module, CFR Education explores the big climate change policy questions. 

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