TRUMP BLOWOUT EXPECTED

Jesse Ramdeo

Se­nior Re­porter

[email protected]

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar is brush­ing aside con­cerns that the De­moc­rats’ sweep­ing vic­to­ries in the Unit­ed States midterm elec­tions could un­der­mine Trinidad and To­ba­go’s re­la­tion­ship with Wash­ing­ton, in­sist­ing that co­op­er­a­tion be­tween the two coun­tries will con­tin­ue re­gard­less of who con­trols the Amer­i­can po­lit­i­cal ma­chin­ery.

The De­moc­rats dealt Trump a sig­nif­i­cant po­lit­i­cal set­back on Tues­day, cap­tur­ing con­trol of both the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives and the Sen­ate in a ma­jor elec­toral re­buke of the Re­pub­li­can ad­min­is­tra­tion.

The vic­to­ries give De­moc­rats con­sid­er­able pow­er to block leg­is­la­tion, scru­ti­nise the ad­min­is­tra­tion, launch in­ves­ti­ga­tions and chal­lenge Trump’s ju­di­cial and se­nior gov­ern­ment ap­point­ments.

Re­spond­ing to ques­tions from Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day, Per­sad-Bisses­sar de­scribed the out­come as pre­dictable, ar­gu­ing that midterm elec­tions have his­tor­i­cal­ly pre­sent­ed chal­lenges for the par­ty oc­cu­py­ing the White House.

“These midterm re­sults were very pre­dictable and in line with the cy­cle of midterm elec­tion re­sults go­ing back decades,” the Prime Min­is­ter said.

She ques­tioned why the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) was re­act­ing so strong­ly to the re­sults, in­sist­ing that the change in con­gres­sion­al con­trol would not dis­rupt the work­ing re­la­tion­ship be­tween Port-of-Spain and Wash­ing­ton.

“I re­al­ly don’t un­der­stand why the PNM is crash­ing out be­cause to­mor­row morn­ing the US and Trinida­di­an gov­ern­ments will con­tin­ue work­ing to­geth­er as nor­mal,” she said.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar main­tained that the Unit­ed States op­er­ates ac­cord­ing to its own na­tion­al in­ter­ests, ir­re­spec­tive of which po­lit­i­cal par­ty con­trols the pres­i­den­cy, Sen­ate or Con­gress.

Padarath fires back at Row­ley

Mean­while, act­ing For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs Min­is­ter Bar­ry Padarath has come out swing­ing against for­mer prime min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley, dis­miss­ing his crit­i­cism of the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) Gov­ern­ment’s for­eign pol­i­cy as a “non­sen­si­cal rant.”

Row­ley de­scribed the De­mo­c­ra­t­ic vic­to­ries as a de­ci­sive re­sponse by the Amer­i­can elec­torate and urged T&T to ex­am­ine its own po­lit­i­cal di­rec­tion.

He said the UNC Gov­ern­ment had open­ly at­tacked and in­sult­ed De­mo­c­ra­t­ic lead­er­ship while in Op­po­si­tion, but had sub­se­quent­ly em­braced the Trump ad­min­is­tra­tion de­spite what he de­scribed as its record of “vile racism, mil­i­tary bul­ly­ing, cor­rup­tion and cru­el­ty.”

“The ram­page in Amer­i­ca has been de­ci­sive­ly ad­dressed by the Amer­i­can peo­ple. This is a good time for the peo­ple of Trinidad and To­ba­go to pay care­ful at­ten­tion to our own sit­u­a­tion and take stock of where we are go­ing and what we have done in re­la­tion to the pol­i­tics that have been round­ly re­pu­di­at­ed in Amer­i­ca yes­ter­day (Tues­day),” Row­ley said.

Speak­ing with Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day, Padarath ac­cused Row­ley and the for­mer PNM ad­min­is­tra­tion of pre­sid­ing over a stag­nant for­eign pol­i­cy that left T&T seek­ing hand­outs rather than pur­su­ing mean­ing­ful diplo­mat­ic re­la­tion­ships.

“For too long, Row­ley and his cronies pos­tured Trinidad and To­ba­go on the in­ter­na­tion­al stage as spine­less beg­gars look­ing for hand­outs rather than mean­ing­ful diplo­mat­ic changes to ad­vance democ­ra­cy or bi­lat­er­al re­la­tion­ships on transna­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty and much-need­ed eco­nom­ic turn­around,” Padarath de­clared.

He ac­cused the for­mer ad­min­is­tra­tion of re­main­ing silent on in­ter­na­tion­al is­sues and main­tain­ing the sta­tus quo, in­sist­ing that the UNC Gov­ern­ment in­tend­ed to take a more as­sertive ap­proach.

Asked whether the De­moc­rats’ midterm vic­to­ries should con­cern the Gov­ern­ment, Padarath down­played their sig­nif­i­cance, de­scrib­ing midterm elec­tions as a snap­shot of the po­lit­i­cal and eco­nom­ic cli­mate.

Padarath al­so turned his crit­i­cism to­wards Row­ley per­son­al­ly, sug­gest­ing the for­mer prime min­is­ter had not re­cov­ered from the PNM’s de­feat at the last gen­er­al elec­tion.

Knight: T&T has put too many eggs in Trump’s bas­ket

But while the Prime Min­is­ter and her act­ing For­eign Af­fairs Min­is­ter are dis­miss­ing con­cerns over the po­lit­i­cal shift in Wash­ing­ton, Pro­fes­sor Andy Knight be­lieves the con­se­quences for T&T could be far-reach­ing.

In a de­tailed as­sess­ment shared with Guardian Me­dia, Knight de­scribed the De­moc­rats’ vic­to­ry as a “Blue tsuna­mi,” ar­gu­ing that T&T’s diplo­mat­ic po­si­tion is par­tic­u­lar­ly vul­ner­a­ble be­cause of what he con­sid­ers the Gov­ern­ment’s close align­ment with Trump.

“For Trinidad and To­ba­go, this mat­ters more than for any oth­er Cari­com state, be­cause Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar teth­ered her­self and her gov­ern­ment to Don­ald Trump,” Knight warned.

He be­lieves De­mo­c­ra­t­ic con­trol of Con­gress could open the door to in­ves­ti­ga­tions in­to some of the Trump ad­min­is­tra­tion’s con­tro­ver­sial for­eign pol­i­cy de­ci­sions in the Caribbean.

These in­clude US mil­i­tary op­er­a­tions, drug-boat strikes and the Jan­u­ary cap­ture of Venezue­lan Pres­i­dent Nicolás Maduro.

He said the De­mo­c­ra­t­ic-con­trolled House For­eign Af­fairs Com­mit­tee could be­come a par­tic­u­lar­ly im­por­tant plat­form for such in­ves­ti­ga­tions.

Knight cau­tioned that while Trump re­tains ex­ec­u­tive au­thor­i­ty over US for­eign pol­i­cy un­til the end of his term in Jan­u­ary 2029, con­gres­sion­al con­trol over fund­ing and over­sight could sig­nif­i­cant­ly con­strain his ad­min­is­tra­tion.

He ex­pects the new De­mo­c­ra­t­ic ma­jor­i­ty to scru­ti­nise fund­ing for Caribbean se­cu­ri­ty op­er­a­tions, Haiti, de­por­ta­tions and oth­er for­eign pol­i­cy ini­tia­tives, while pur­su­ing hear­ings and sub­poe­nas in­to al­leged hu­man rights abus­es.

Knight al­so raised con­cerns about the im­pli­ca­tions for T&T’s po­si­tion on Cu­ba and Venezuela.

His ad­vice was clear, “T&T made a huge mis­take hitch­ing its wag­on to one man - Don­ald Trump. The midterm blue tsuna­mi should serve as a les­son of what not to do when you are a small is­land state.”