US presidential election outcome also verdict on Biden: Former Indian envoy

With Donald Trump elected president of the US, riding a historic political comeback, a former Indian diplomat on Wednesday said the election outcome is also a verdict on incumbent President Joe Biden.

The 78-year-old Republican leader won the US presidency for a second term, trouncing his Democratic rival Kamala Harris in a bitterly-fought election.

While the formal Inauguration ceremony at the White House is still nearly two months away, India's former ambassador to Italy, K P Fabian, suggested that Trump would like the "Ukraine war to be over".

Asked about the outcome of the US election, Fabian said, "Though Kamala Harris was the candidate, it was also a verdict on (Joe) Biden. Because, she was the Vice President and Biden nominated her. So, partly, she was carrying the Biden burden in respect of the economy."  And, with prices going up, especially of gas, and for Americans who roam all round in their cars, this is very important, he said.

 

Many US voters counted immigration, border security, gun control laws, reproductive rights and foreign policy as factors weighing on their minds in this election.

Fabian said the Russia-Ukraine war and the West Asia conflict may have been a factor that might have influenced voters' decisions.

"Ukraine war, you may say majority of Americans support Ukraine, but it doesn't follow that Americans want a big war. And, that America should be sending so much money by way of military aid and economic aid," he said.

Military aid doesn't matter because the money remains in America, selling weapons. But in economic aid, the money goes, the former diplomat said.

"And... the war in West Asia, Biden made a mistake...," Fabian argued.

Trump, who has been a real estate baron, was elected as the 45th President of the US, riding on his 'Make America Great Again' campaign, and returns to the White House as the 47th President of that country, clearing the 270 electoral votes needed to clinch the presidency.

Venu Rajamony, who served as India's envoy to the Netherlands from 2017 to 2020, said Trump has a number of foreign policy issues on his table, even more important is the Russia-Ukraine conflict, and similarly what is happening in Gaza.

When asked, if the Ukraine war will be high on Trump's agenda, he said, "absolutely".

"In fact, he himself had said that it is high on his agenda, and knowing the kind of person he is, he may not even wait till the formal inauguration, so he may make statements, make moves which indicates or reflects his thinking on how the problem should be solved. So, let us wait and watch," he added.

On Trump's win and the West Asia conflict, Rajamony said, people who support him have been big backers of Israel, so whether it emboldens Israel to continue and increase the intensity of the war, whether Israel pulls back and offers a ceasefire in return from American support to sort of restructure the architecture of the Middle East in Israel's favour, "all this has to be seen, we have to wait and see what approaches President Trump adopts".

Many US voters had acknowledged that West Asia and ohter conflicts did weigh on their minds before they cast their vote.

The run-up to what has been described as one of the closest US elections in recent times, saw Trump and Harris holding packed rallies and firing fierce verbal volleys against each other.

Fabian recalled the bitter campaign and some of the words used by Trump in it that also stoked controversies and drew sharp reaction from the Democratic camp.

"He has a style which Americans like it, a substantial number of them like it," he said.

Rajamony, currently working as a professor of diplomatic practice at O P Jindal Global University, recalled that the Indian foreign minister had earlier said that the outlook for the world in the next 4-5 years is, "very grim".

He argued that Trump winning the race to the White House makes it "grim as well volatile and uncertain" and "we just don't know what approaches and what policies he will adopt and it could be very unconventional policies."  Rajamony said it was "disappointing" that Harris lost, but that doesn't mean the support for the causes she stood for are over.

Had 60-year-old Harris, the daughter of Indian and Jamaican immigrants, won, she would have also scripted history by becoming the first woman, first Black woman and first person of South Asian descent to occupy the top post at the White House.

"I think, much more important than the Indian descent of Kamala Harris is what she stood for, and what she represented in terms of standing up for the US Constitution, preventing attacks on the Constitution, creating an inclusive society, promoting the American middle-class, working class as different from the rich, of course, she stood or women, and women of colour, so it is in a way disappointing that she lost, but that doesn't mean support for these causes are over," Rajamony said.

"We all know that the US remains a deeply divided, polarised society, and I am sure the battle on many of these issues, like reproductive rights of women will continue even in greater strength now with President Trump in power," he added.

The former envoy said this victory "should not embolden" more right-wing people in the US, to take even more illiberal polices.

"I don't think the battle is over, I don't think the healing will begin immediately," he said.