COLUMNS

U.S. Adversaries and Allies Start the Countdown to 2020

Reva Goujon

VP of Global Analysis, Stratfor

Jun 22, 2019 | 10:00 GMT

U.S. President Donald Trump officially launches his 2020 reelection campaign with a rally in Orlando, Florida, on June 18, 2019.

U.S. President Donald Trump officially launches his 2020 reelection campaign in Orlando, Florida, on June 18. More and more countries may decide to run out the clock to the next U.S. presidential election in November 2020 rather than negotiate a deal with a mercurial Trump that may not even last.

(MANDEL NGAN/AFP/Getty Images)

Highlights

With 17 months to go before voters either reject or reelect U.S. President Donald Trump, many countries are recalculating what to do with that window of time, while Trump himself is coming under pressure to show results from his multiple "maximum pressure" campaigns.
For Trump's chief targets, including Iran and possibly China, it may be better to hunker down and resist than incur the cost of negotiating a bad deal with a short-fuse White House.
Other targets, such as Mexico, the European Union and India, will try to drag out talks, avoid escalation and pray for a change in 2020.
Israel, Poland, Taiwan and North Korea fall in the basket of opportunists that will act swiftly to try and extract as many benefits as they can from Trump's administration while the window is still open.
Trump is approaching a reckoning in his foreign policy. For every challenge he has created, he will have to either significantly scope down his demands to clinch a deal before 2020 or stomach the consequences of prolonged confrontation.

There are less than 17 months to go until the 2020 U.S. presidential election. For U.S. President Donald Trump and his reelection prospects, that means expectations are rising for him to deliver results on the past two-and-a-half years of hardball tactics against U.S. adversaries and allies in pursuit of an artful -- and evidently still elusive -- deal. For every country that has something massive to gain or (more likely) to lose from the Trump presidency, this is the time to make some big decisions on what to do with that window. That is if it even is a "window." For the more prudent strategic planners who are wary of polling and cognizant of just how potent political polarization in the United States has grown, this is also the time to prepare contingencies for a scenario in which the Trump era extends by another four years....

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