The 2020 Candidates Aren’t Talking About Foreign Policy. They Need to Start.
ONE OF THE MOST STRIKING THINGS ABOUT THE DEMOCRATIC PRIMARY SO FAR—aside from the sheer number of candidates running—is how little any of them has said about foreign policy. With very few exceptions (like one-off essays by Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders), the group has largely ignored the rest of the world and focused on domestic issues.
Such neglect probably shouldn’t come as a surprise. Few of the governors, senators, and mayors now running for president have international experience to draw on. And they know that while American voters do care about foreign policy, especially when it comes to fighting terrorism and protecting U.S. jobs, most don’t care about it as much as they do about domestic issues. Very few U.S. presidents have won office by building their campaigns around international themes.
Despite that reality, the fact that even the current candidates who do have serious foreign-policy chops, like former Vice President Joe Biden, aren’t talking about the subject is a big problem, for two reasons.
The first is that this is a particularly fraught and dangerous moment for the United States and the world. The international order seems less steady
