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US Election
The US House voted to ban Chinese-owned video-sharing app TikTok on Wednesday, sending the bill to the Senate, where it faces an uncertain fate. Democratic Senate Leader Chuck Schumer has not committed to bringing it to a vote.
Republican and Democratic representatives — who voted 352 to 65 to pass the bill — argue that China could use TikTok’s algorithm to feed propaganda to Americans and collect intelligence about users. Intelligence experts have warned for years that Westerners should be skeptical of assurances that the company does not share intelligence with the Chinese government. TikTok says such concerns are ridiculous.
The bill would force Beijing-based ByteDance to sell the company to a buyer approved by the US government or have it removed from US phones in six months.
Biden has said he would sign the bill, but Donald Trump, who tried and failed to shut down TikTok, recently reversed himself and now opposes banning the app.
Also this week, Canada's Liberals acknowledged that they had ordered a national security review of the popular app last autumn without making it public.
Canada has not said whether it would follow Washington's lead if it is banned, but last year Ottawa banned TikTok from government devices. Tech analyst Carmi Levy told CTV that Canada would likely follow an American ban. “We can’t afford to be out of sync with them on issues of digital policy that are this important.”
In the meantime, the Canadian government says TikTok will be under "enhanced scrutiny," under the Investment Canada Act's new policy on foreign investments in digital media.
Ian Bremmer shares his insights on global politics this week on World In :60.
Four years since the US declared COVID a national emergency, how did it permanently reshape the world?
Well, a couple of things. First, it meant that US-China relations got worse, not better. The World Health Organization, the one global organization meant to deal with pandemics, got delegitimized. This was not a crisis that led to greater cooperation. It led to greater mistrust and greater polarization, in part because it wasn't a big enough crisis. Thankfully, we had vaccines really fast, and it also turned out that COVID really affected mostly the super elderly and those with serious preexisting conditions. All of that allowed the geopolitical rifts that already exist to get worse. One good thing, aside from the fact that technology really works, is that the Europeans got stronger on the back of this crisis. They now have more coordinated capabilities to respond to health crises than they did before the pandemic hit. And that has been the EU response to a lot of crises recently, Brexit, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, you name it.
As the US House goes after TikTok, does it speak to a broader US-China battle?
Well, it speaks to significant mistrust between the two countries. Espionage by the Chinese against the United States, by the way, that goes both ways of course. The Americans just aren't concerned about US espionage into China. Also, the fact that the Chinese don't allow Western social media companies to have access to the Chinese population and data. So no one should be all that surprised that the Americans are interested in forcing ByteDance to spin off TikTok. Having said that, the Chinese are pretty unhappy about it and have said that they're not going to spin it off. We'll see if their bark is equivalent to their bite. Assuming this passes in short order in House and Senate. Biden has said that he would sign it and then there's the broader question of does it undermine what has been a pretty strong effort by both the Americans and Chinese to communicate more thoroughly in the relationship and stabilize the baseline so that we don't have conflict that scales out of control and that has worked reasonably well since the APEC summit back in San Francisco in November? But that doesn't mean it will hold if the Americans start throwing more punches. On balance, I think forcing China to spin off TikTok is a reasonable thing for the Americans to do, but it will be one more straw on the camel's back. Let's see what happens in terms of Chinese response.
Finally, Princess Kate and the photoshop-fail heard around the world!
Big deal? Well, look, I mean, I am someone, as you know, that tries to keep a much lower profile than Princess Kate. So I don't like to necessarily share all the things that I'm doing around the world. But, I mean, you know, given everyone focusing on Kate's photo, I will share that in the last few days, I was there with Sweden, of course, and the prime minister, who I know well when they formally joined NATO. There was, of course, also the State of the Union, which, you know, I was doing live commentary on and right there from the gallery. But you probably are surprised that I was also right behind the scenes at the Oscars. I don't usually show for that. And it's not because I don't wear a tie, but they gave me dispensation. And also let me bring Moose, which is very important. Don't fall asleep on Princess Kate, right? I mean, you know, she has a hard enough time and she's got to distract away from King Charles. We don't know what's going on with him either. We don't really care. At least I don't.
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They did it again. President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump have mustered enough delegates in the primaries to secure their respective party nominations heading into this November’s presidential election — not that anyone expected otherwise.
For Biden, it was his win in Georgia last night that clinched it for the Democrats, while for Trump it was the GOP tally in Washington state. The rematch of 2020 comes despite both men’s unpopularity: Recent polling has Biden’s disapproval rating at 56.5%, while Trump’s unfavorable rating is nearly as high at 52.5%.
What’s next: The matchup that has looked inevitable for months is officially underway, but it’s unclear when, or whether, Biden will face off with his predecessor in debates. Trump has said, “I’m ready to go, ANY TIME, ANY PLACE!” Biden has appeared open to the idea, noting that it “depends on his behavior.”
In the meantime, expect plenty of campaign events and advertisements focused on both men’s ages, abortion, the economy, illegal immigration, and entitlements (more on that below).
Hard Numbers: Republicans regret Trump, Bosnia gets EU pathway, Pakistan swears in cabinet, Somalia’s pirates seize the moment
50 million:Donald Trump may have a chokehold on the Republican Party, but that doesn’t mean he has a grip on all Republicans. The group Republicans Voters Against Trump, which first appeared in 2020, has recently raised $50 million to produce a campaign of video testimonials by Republicans who voted for Trump in 2016 and 2020 but say they just can’t do it again this year.
30: Almost 30 years since the end of the Yugoslav civil wars, Bosnia and Herzegovina will be invited to begin EU accession talks, despite still-simmering ethnic tensions between Bosniaks and Serbs in the country. The talks are no guarantee of joining, which can take many years, but the perception of growing Russian influence in the Balkans has heightened Brussels’ interest in getting membership talks on track. Of the six former Yugoslav republics, only Slovenia and Croatia are in the EU.
19: Pakistan’s newly elected Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has a cabinet in place after its 19 members were sworn in earlier this week. They have their work cut out for them. Pakistan is mired in a severe economic crisis and must, almost immediately, negotiate a fresh $3 billion IMF loan package. Meanwhile, the streets are still hot with protesters supporting jailed opposition leader and former PM Imran Khan, whose alliance won the most votes in last month’s election but was shut out of government by Sharif’s coalition.
23: For the first time since December, Somali pirates successfully hijacked a vessel off the Horn of Africa, taking the 23 crew members of a Bangladeshi-flagged bulk carrier hostage. As Houthi attacks in the Red Sea draw much of the naval security attention in the region, the fearsome pirates of Somali are letting that Jolly Roger fly.On Monday, a TV interviewer asked Donald Trump to detail his “outlook on how to handle entitlements: Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid?” His response: “There is a lot you can do in terms of entitlements — in terms of cutting — and in terms of also the theft and the bad management of entitlements.”
Within hours, strategists working on President Joe Biden’s reelection campaign issued a 20-second digital response for release on its X, Facebook, Instagram, and Threads social media accounts. It featured Trump’s words followed by a quick clip from Biden’s State of the Union Speech last week in which he pledged that “If anyone here tries to cut Social Security, Medicare or raise the retirement age, I will stop you.”
The Trump campaign quickly accused the Biden team of twisting Trump’s meaning. A spokesman insisted he meant cuts to “waste” in the programs, not to benefits.
Despite widespread concerns about the impact of long-term US debt, cuts to entitlement benefits or calls to raise the retirement age have long been taboo – nearly 80% said last year that they opposed reducing the size of Social Security – in American politics. We may find out this election year if that’s still true.
Trump has opened divisions within his own party on this issue in the past, and no matter what he says on it in the future, the Biden campaign will highlight his every word.The most hotly debated question about a possible second Donald Trump foreign policy: Would he simply abandon Ukraine and its fight to repel Russian invaders? We might now have an answer.
Hungary’s PM Viktor Orbán, a political ally of both Trump and Russia’s Vladimir Putin, announced after meeting with Trump in Florida yesterday that the former president “will not give a penny in the Ukraine-Russia war.” He told Hungary’s M1 TV channel that “if the Americans don’t give money, the Europeans alone are unable to finance this war. And then the war is over.”
Trump himself has yet to comment on this claim that he would end the conflict by forcing a Ukrainian surrender.
Putin has also added more pressure on Ukraine. On Monday, he called it “quite understandable” that Pope Francis has reportedly urged Ukraine’s leaders to find “the courage of the white flag” to negotiate with the Kremlin.
Does Ukraine have any cause for near-term optimism? Despite delays, a few trained Ukrainian pilots will likely have six US-made F16 aircraft ready to go by this summer. Their successful use against Russian forces could accelerate the pace of training and delivery. (A total of 45 F16s have been promised.)
These aircraft won’t win the war for Ukraine, but significant numbers of them will boost Ukraine’s offensive and defensive capabilities. The timing of their delivery is critical. You can read details on their possible battlefield importance here.
100 billion: India has signed a trade agreement with the four members of the European Free Trade Association — Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, and Switzerland — aimed at integrating supply chains and opening new opportunities for trade and investment. The deal includes a commitment to invest a whopping $100 billion in India over the next 15 years to create 1 million jobs.
7: The big winner at the Oscars on Sunday was "Oppenheimer," director Christopher Nolan's historic drama about the invention of nuclear weapons, which took home seven prizes, including Best Film. The documentary "20 Days in Mariupol" also won Ukraine its first Oscar.
10 million: The Biden campaign says it raised over $10 million in the 24 hours following the State of the Union, which served as a de facto campaign event. It’s the campaign’s largest one-day haul yet. With a long eight-month campaign ahead, the Biden team has been stockpiling a war chest as Trump fought contested primaries (not to mention legal battles).
79: The Portuguese center-right Democratic Alliance took 79 seats in Sunday's elections, ousting the incumbent socialist party but falling well short of the 115 seats it would need for a majority government. The party's leader, however, swore he would not work with the far-right Chega party, which surged in the polls, to establish a majority.
73.93: On Friday, Irish voters rejected proposed constitutional changes concerning the concept of family and care in a nationwide referendum. The first proposal would have recognized “family” as a couple without regard to their sex, while the second aimed to strip reference to the role of women in the home. Well over half, some 67.7% of Irish voters, opposed the first, while 73.93% said no to the second.
3: Progress in Libya’s long conflict may soon be at hand: On Sunday, three leaders agreed on the need to form a new unified government to supervise the country’s long-delayed elections. Elections were due in December 2021, but fell apart owing to disputes over who was eligible to run.