Biden Brings More Class Warfare to Foreign Policy

Despite presenting his agenda as the antithesis of Donald Trump’s, President Joe Biden, like his predecessor, is managing global affairs as an extension of domestic politics and economic policy. The goal of what the Biden administration calls “” is to promote the interests of America’s middle-class and working people. Supporters this approach as a reorientation away from a post–World War II foreign policy that, in their view, privileged the rich by pushing trade agreements that allowed competition from imports and enforcing a multinational order that allowed global business to flourish at workers’ expense. Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s mea culpa earlier this year for his own previous support of in these terms: “We will fight for every American job and for the rights, protections, and interests of all American workers … Our trade policies will need to answer very clearly how they will grow the American middle class, create new and better jobs, and benefit all Americans, not only those for whom the economy is already working.”