Rash: The global glare on America’s election

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The consequence of this country’s election for Ukraine was expressed in words. But it was the alarm on a Ukrainian journalist’s phone that left the most indelible impression.

It rang as Kristina Zeleniuk, a Kyiv-based foreign-policy journalist for 1+1 Media, was in St. Paul as part of a 10-member World Press Institute cohort that’s in Minnesota this month. The alarm, she said, alerts Kyiv residents to take shelter. Checking news sources back home, she said “they had just noticed a Russian missile that was flying in from the north to the Kyiv region.“ It’s “a very good example why the U.S. election is important for us … . [The] only system in the world that can shoot down Russian ballistic missiles is American.”

So she listened for — but didn’t hear — former President Donald Trump even acknowledging that he wanted Ukraine to win the war, despite directly being asked three times by ABC’s David Muir during Tuesday night’s debate. And she heard earlier, in 2022, when Sen. JD Vance, now Trump’s running mate, said “I don’t really care what happens to Ukraine one way or another.”

“We are very interested in American politics and American elections because the fact is that the U.S. is the main military donor of Ukraine,” Zeleniuk said, adding that the Ukrainian government relies on and hopes to even increase that aid.

All 10 journalists were keenly interested in American politics and elections, as evidenced by their earlier meeting with Secretary of State Steve Simon, who fielded questions from the cohort, including a pointed (and poignant) one from Brazil-based Luciana Dyniewicz, which was prefaced by this statement: “In Brazil we have an image that everything works better in the U.S. than in Brazil — except the election system.” (Although that got tested in a Jan. 6-style ransacking of the National Congress in 2023 after right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro lost his re-election bid.)

In a notably nonpartisan manner, Simon explained how his office and the state conducts elections, and how Minnesotans respond with turnout levels that often lead the nation. Democracy is vibrant in Finland, too, where Sanna Raita-aho reports on politics for the Helsinki-based Finnish News Agency. Debates in her country were more staid, she said, agreeing with the cohort’s consensus that Vice President Kamala Harris won the debate “very clearly,” in part with “smart one-liners which were also very entertaining.” But like other observers abroad and stateside she still expects this country’s vote to be close.

Raita-aho said that “I of course paid attention also to what Trump was saying about Ukraine, because we just recently became members of NATO,” referring to the transatlantic alliance that the former president once labeled “obsolete.”

“Even before this debate,” she continued, “there has been a lot of talk in Finland on how Trump’s election victory [would] affect NATO and Finland’s national security.”

The Finnish journalist said that “I understand that it’s a national election, after all, so American people are probably also very interested in their own domestic issues. But I felt that what Kamala Harris was trying to tell the voters — that many European leaders would find it better if Trump was not ruling the White House — that seemed to be her message to the wider audience.”

And yet, Raita-aho said, “It’s still actually a question for me, what would be Kamala Harris’ future plan for Ukraine and European security? And in general, is the U.S. going to turn more to China, regardless of who is president?”

The paucity of specificity defines debates among presidential candidates. But at least Ukraine and NATO were up for debate. Much of the rest of the world wasn’t, including U.S. relations with India, the world’s largest democracy and key to Biden’s strategy to respond to China’s rise.

“There is a geopolitical climate where China’s growing might and growing economic capacity and also the potential belligerence that has been on display has been a cause of tremendous concern for Indians, which has given an impetus to India-U.S. ties more than ever before,” said Anando Bhakto, who creates content for multiple Indian entities. “There is a recognition in America, as is there in our country, that India is the bulwark against authoritarian regimes in this part of the globe.”

Bhakto added that “whether it was the Republican or the Democratic candidate, they mentioned China, but they didn’t mention India. So I’m not sure what role they envisage for India in this emerging security situation. What is their respective vision for capacity building of India? So these are areas where there is ambiguity and we would like to have the specifics rather than just shallow talk of growing India-U.S. relations.”

Or in the case of the debate, no talk at all. Even though the U.S. isn’t just important to India geopolitically but socially, too.

“Indians have been fascinated with the U.S.,” Bhakto said, “because going to America and making a career or having any kind of engagement with America was always seen as something that uplifts your social profile.”

Harris’ mother is one such Indian who came to America. But the only reference to the candidate’s background were Trump’s most recent remarks about his opponent’s racial identity. Harris responded that it was a “tragedy” that a candidate “has consistently over the course of his career attempted to use race to divide the American people.”

There “are many common themes between India and America when it comes to how right-wing politics is playing out,” said Bhakto. In fact, he added, “Anywhere in the globe these are common issues where the right-wing powers deploy a language of hate and division and spur fear in people and create a common enemy to bolster their political power,” which Trump, he said, “is accused of doing in America and Mr. [Prime Minister Narendra] Modi is accused of doing in India.”

The journalists interviewed noted the accessibility of U.S. lawmakers and officials, including being available for post-debate comments. Zeleniuk said that when the WPI cohort watched the debate together they all commented on how “Democratic and Republican teams and your senators were standing in front of the mic, just like a correspondent.”

And the correspondents moderating were admired, too — even though some Republicans took strong exception to their role.

Indian media often accelerates disinformation, Bhakto said. “So it was refreshing and reassuring to see that media is playing its role as a watchdog in the American election. I keenly watched [Tuesday’s debate], and as my colleagues just mentioned, the spontaneous fact-checking was admirable, and that’s the basic difference: the role of the media in being an arbiter for truth and justice and fair elections.”

So just as it is with this country’s politics, when it comes to America’s media, the whole world is watching.