How Folks Abroad Are Viewing America's Presidential Election

Brady Kiesling

 

Saturday––Jeff

 

I’ve been mulling over this question for quite a while. It’s hard not to what with practically every non-American you meet wanting to know “What’s happening in America?” and battalions of American visitors stand ready to unload their political opinions on anyone willing to listen—or not.

 

In other words, it’s sort of what it’s like back home in America.  Which is why I decided to spend the run-up to November 5^th isolated in Europe far from the Sturm und Drang of it all.

 

Ah, the best laid plans.  No such luck.  All the world is fixed on our election.  In truth, many I meet seem more concerned about the outcome and aware of the issues at stake than my fellow Americans.

 

So, I thought I’d share this opinion piece written for Ekathimerini, Greece’s “paper of record,” by Brady Kiesling, titled “New Hope in the United States.”  Brady is a former US Diplomat, and chair of Greece’s Democrats Abroad, the overseas arm of the Democratic Party.  I think you can guess who he’s voting for, but here’s Brady’s take on where the election stands.

 

There’s a new wave of optimism in America with Kamala Harris as the Democratic candidate for US president. This matters for America, for the world and for Greece.

 

At the beginning of July, European politicians and journalists were unhappily predicting the return of a president who despises NATO, treats climate change as a hoax, promotes global inequality, and wishes to return women to the role they played when he was a child in the 1950s. But in the few short weeks since she entered the race, Harris has come from behind to build a small but clear lead over former president Donald J. Trump both in national polling and in swing states.

 

We see a transformed political dynamic, reflected in record levels of Democratic Party fundraising and swelling volunteer numbers; we see it in increased voter engagement; we see it in how independent voters are re-evaluating their interests. The change is palpable, including among the members of Democrats Abroad here in Greece.

 

In just two months, Americans will go to the polls. The election will be very close, despite the Harris-Walz ticket’s comfortable lead in the popular vote. Smaller, conservative states have a built-in advantage in the electoral college. For pragmatic, humane policies to prevail in the next US administration, US citizens abroad will need to vote in record numbers.

 

The estimated 70,000 to 100,000 American citizens in Greece could determine the outcome of this year’s presidential election. On election night in 2020, you may remember Trump’s apparent lead early in the vote count. It was the ballots counted last, the ones cast by Americans living abroad, that decided the US presidential election in Arizona and Georgia. Joe Biden’s margin of victory in Arizona was 10,457 votes and the number of overseas ballots received was 18,435. The numbers for Georgia were similar.

 

Your vote matters, in other words, and not only in the clear choice between Trump and Harris. For women in particular, much is on the line. Their right to make decisions about their own bodies, a fundamental freedom, has been stripped away by a Republican-controlled Supreme Court and “conservative” state legislatures, in defiance of the will of the majority of American voters. In a number of states – Arizona, Missouri, Florida, South Dakota, Colorado, New York, Maryland and Nevada – citizens get to decide this November whether to enshrine women’s rights in their state constitutions. Your voice in these state races will be significant as well. Only by electing Democratic members of Congress and state legislatures can we hope to defend the hard-won freedoms of ordinary American citizens.

 

The abortion ban is only the most obvious example of how the Republican Party has veered into extremism at Trump’s behest. The mob that stormed the Capitol to overturn the election result does not represent mainstream America. We instinctively share the disgust of the US Army at Trump’s misuse of our National Cemeteries and dead heroes for political theater.

 

Voters want a Federal Election Commission with teeth, one that will tell them who are the billionaires funding Donald Trump’s campaign, and what – apart from his legal fees – those contributions are paying for. At a more basic level, parents want their children at school to be allowed to read books chosen by librarians, not politicians, and to learn US history taught by actual teachers.

 

Trump is becoming increasingly obsessed and unpredictable, so consumed by personal grievances and narcissistic rants that his own campaign aides are trying to keep him quiet. He still has not explained what he means by fixing American democracy so his supporters won’t ever have to vote again. Quite simply, Trump is a risk to the world, and in particular to the rules-based international order that Greece relies on. His vindictive and unpredictable behavior undermines international institutions like NATO while encouraging autocrats like Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan or Russian President Vladimir Putin.

 

The outcome of this year’s US presidential elections will matter greatly to the world and to Greece. The world needs a competent hand at America’s helm.

 

American citizens abroad can play a decisive role in deciding that future if they exercise their right to vote. We call on them to do so.

 

––Jeff