Biden and Netanyahu meet to discuss ‘hard issues’ as tensions simmer

NEW YORK — President Joe Biden and Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu met Wednesday for the first time since the prime minister took office last December, placing the leaders face-to-face at a time of strained relations.

The location of the high-stakes bilateral, on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly instead of the White House, was viewed as a signal of U.S. discontentment with Israel. The president and his White House have raised alarms about Netanyahu’s efforts to weaken the power of Israel’s judicial system, a move that critics say leads the country toward authoritarianism.

At the start of their discussion, the two leaders sat next to one another in a meeting room, with U.S. and Israeli flags as a backdrop. Biden said he hoped the two leaders would meet again by the end of the year, in Washington, and that their discussion Wednesday would include challenging topics, namely “upholding democratic values.”

“Today, we’re going to discuss some of the hard issues, that is upholding democratic values that lie at the heart of our partnership, including the checks and balances in our systems and preserving the path to a negotiated two-state solution, and ensuring that Iran never, never acquires a nuclear weapon,” Biden said.

“If you and I 10 years ago were talking about normalization with Saudi Arabia, I think we'd look at each other like, ‘Who’s been drinking what?’” the president added.

Netanyahu said Israel shared a “commitment to democracy,” while noting he sees this as a “time of great promise” but also “great danger.” He also agreed with both the president’s sentiment about the prospect of normalization with Riyadh.

Behind closed doors, the two leaders broached Netanyahu’s court reform agenda that seeks to curb the power of judges. Biden has publicly urged the prime minister to find compromise, saying that he “cannot continue down this road” amid monthslong protests against his government. But the Israeli leader has forged ahead even as his negotiations with Israeli opposition drag, moving the first major piece of legislation through the parliament earlier this summer.

The White House, in a readout of the meeting, noted Biden addressed Israel’s treatment of Palestinians. Netanyahu’s hard-right government has moved to expand Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank, igniting tensions with Palestinians and drawing international condemnation.

“To that end, President Biden called on all parties to fulfill their commitments made during meetings held earlier this year in Aqaba, Jordan and Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, to include refraining from further unilateral measures,” according to the White House statement. “The President also reiterated his concern about any fundamental changes to Israel’s democratic system, absent the broadest possible consensus. Finally, President Biden invited Prime Minister Netanyahu to Washington D.C. before the end of the year to continue direct collaboration on this broad range of issues.”

As the U.S. discusses a potential Saudi normalization deal, the president also emphasized U.S. support for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

“While securing normalization of ties between Israel and Saudi Arabia is a worthy goal, any such agreement must meaningfully advance resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the end of ongoing occupation — not sideline or ignore them. Diplomatic efforts should focus on advancing true peace, security and human rights in the region, and not on handing out unwarranted and regionally destabilizing gifts to PM Netanyahu or Mohammed Bin Salman,” said J Street President Jeremy Ben-Ami in a statement.

The president was also scheduled later Wednesday to hold a bilateral meeting with Brazilian President Lula da Silva, with whom he will deliver remarks at a labor event. Biden will then attend two campaign receptions before returning to Washington.

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‘Thank you very much’: Biden praises Hochul, but stays clear of Adams

NEW YORK — President Joe Biden went out of his way at a Tuesday night reception to praise a certain New York official for hosting him for the past three days during the United Nations General Assembly.

It wasn’t New York City Mayor Eric Adams.

“I first want to thank Gov. [Kathy] Hochul,” Biden said at the top of his speech at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. “Kathy, thank you very much for everything this great city has done to make this General Assembly a success.”

The comments served as the latest evidence of heightened friction between Adams and Biden, Democrats who once appeared to be close allies. The two are not planning to have any face time during the president’s trip to Manhattan amid public spats over the White House’s response to the city’s migrant crisis.

Adams has had a packed schedule this week meeting with dignitaries from around the globe and mayors from around the country. Biden never made the calendar.

The Democratic mayor said Wednesday his office was still working closely with the White House, but he also refused to sugarcoat challenges that the influx of asylum-seekers has brought to the city. That bluntness, he suggested, has contributed to the deteriorating relationship with the president.

“There's an authentic communication style that I have, and sometimes that offends people,” Adams said on Fox 5 in New York when asked about Hochul’s interaction with the commander in chief. “But I'm not going to be dishonest to New Yorkers and finding a word in a thesaurus that makes it sound politically correct.”

Hochul and Adams have both been critical of the federal government’s response to the more than 100,000 migrants who have come to the city over the past year, with more than 60,000 still in the city’s care.

But the governor has been more measured in her appraisal compared to the outspoken mayor. As a result, she has maintained a more cordial relationship with the nation’s most powerful Democrat.

Hochul told reporters Wednesday that after she arrived at the reception, she was told Biden wanted to see her.

“I always welcome the president when he comes when its available. … There was interest in the White House in having me spend time speaking with the president, and that’s exactly what happened,” she said.

The two discussed many of the requests Hochul has made over the past year, including more federally owned sites where the city and state could erect migrant shelters.

She did not, however, raise the issue of the state issuing its own local version of work authorization to speed up getting migrants placed in jobs.

“I felt that he is listening to us,” she said of her tete-a-tete, which she described as productive.

Hochul remains on a list of surrogates for the president’s reelection while Adams was dropped from the roster after saying the president “failed” New York City earlier this year.

Adams, while invited, declined to attend the soiree.

It wasn’t always this way.

Shortly after winning the Democratic primary for mayor, Adams dubbed himself the “Biden of Brooklyn.” After taking office, he hosted the president during a visit to the city to discuss public safety. And at this time last year, Biden and Adams rubbed elbows at both a fundraiser and a UN reception.

As of late Wednesday morning, however, there was no indication the two would meet before Biden heads back to Washington in the evening.

The city estimates it will spend $12 billion on asylum-seekers through 2025, a price tag that has driven Adams to repeatedly plead for more funding from Washington and quicker work authorization for the migrants, along with a more cohesive strategy at the border to spread the flow of migrants out to more places in the country.

“I have to defend the city that I defended as a police officer and now as the mayor of the city," he said during a separate television interview Wednesday on PIX 11. "New York City must not be going through this. It's not sustainable."

His administration has opened more than 200 emergency shelters and is currently preparing to house thousands of asylum-seekers in tents at Floyd Bennett Field, a former federal airbase that was the subject of negotiations between Hochul and Biden.

A group of Republican and moderate Democrat lawmakers have sued to stop the opening of that facility — part of a broader backlash against shelters in certain pockets of the city.

Late Tuesday, as Biden settled in for the night in Manhattan, residents in Staten Island blocked a bus carrying migrants, shouting that the passengers inside were not welcome.

The protest was the latest sign of tension in the city. Adams condemned the display.

“We'll manage this crisis, but we're not going to do it with violence, and we're not going to do it with hateful terminologies spewed at individuals,” Adams said of the protest.

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‘He boxed Biden in’: Dems fear Trump is outfoxing Biden on the auto worker strike

Some Joe Biden allies fear that Donald Trump is outmaneuvering them on the auto workers’ strike with his decision to head to Detroit for a speech next week.

Democrats close to the White House said they saw Trump’s trip as a plainly cynical ploy to gain political advantage from the current United Auto Workers strike at three plants. But they also worry it is a sign that the ex-president had a more sophisticated campaign than in previous cycles — and that Biden’s operation needs to step it up.

“We should not underestimate Donald Trump. He's a survivor and this is going to be a very hard-fought campaign,” said Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), a member of Biden’s national advisory board who was in Wayne, Mich., and Toledo, Ohio, on Monday with UAW members. “We need a message to working-class Americans. Right now, they're still hurting in terms of gas prices, food prices, housing costs, utilities costs, and they don't feel like their wages are going up fast enough, and they feel like the very wealthy are getting too much of the rewards. That's what I heard on the picket lines.”

A union adviser, speaking on condition of anonymity in order to offer a blunt evaluation, said Trump "is still himself and will say and do crazy shit.” But, the person added, “he actually has people who know what they're doing. He boxed Biden in. It was kinda genius."

Inside the White House and Biden campaign, operatives scoffed at such an assessment. But their public utterances — including aggressive criticism of Trump’s record on labor policy — betrayed concern that the former president could make further inroads among union voters.

And their private deliberations suggested that they were still grappling with how the White House should approach the strike.

Biden's team has privately weighed whether to dispatch a top lieutenant to the picket line to stand alongside the UAW workers, according to two people familiar with those discussions. The exact details of who might go or where they could travel are unclear.

Yet even as they considered sending a public-facing official to the site of the strike, the White House was pulling back on some behind-the-scenes engagement. On Tuesday, the administration scrapped its plan to have two Biden aides head to Detroit this week to help both sides after union officials complained about it.

The back and forth within the White House over how to handle the strike illustrates the jam that Biden finds himself in as talks drag on between the so-called Big Three car companies and a powerful union that is withholding its endorsement from Biden over his handling of electric vehicle subsidies. Though the strike is limited to three plants for now, it could deal a serious blow to the economy if a deal isn’t reached soon and more workers walk out.

The White House has been trying to avoid a prolonged strike while expressing support for the demands of the workers. But there has been brewing dissatisfaction among Democrats and union officials over their approach — mainly, a belief that the president, a self-professed union diehard, underestimated the degree of the UAW’s discontent.

There are many unknowns about Trump’s visit to Michigan, including where he will speak and whether he will show up to the picket line as well. But his decision to go in the first place startled some Democrats.

“Trump scooped us. Now if we announce we’re going, it looks like we’re just going because of Trump,” said a national Democratic strategist. “We waited too long. That’s the challenge.”

Biden campaign officials insist that it’s the president who has the upper hand: They argue that Trump’s visit to Michigan gives them a chance to remind voters — and union members specifically — of Trump’s record. Indisputably, it’s a record that includes unfulfilled promises to workers and comments attacking UAW leadership.

In their view, it’s Trump who needs to catch up to Biden after the Democrat doubled his margin of victory among union households nationwide in 2020 compared with Hillary Clinton four years prior.

“Donald Trump’s anti-worker, anti-union record is one of the key reasons Michigan rejected Trump in 2020 and sent Joe Biden to the White House,” said Ammar Moussa, a spokesman for the Biden campaign. “His failed presidency is defined by auto companies shuttering their doors and shipping American jobs overseas while lining the pockets of the wealthy and big corporations.”

Michigan Democrats also slammed Trump as attempting to exploit workers and hiding his true record.

Trump “is not a person who is going to fight for pay increases, pensions, health care or job security for workers,” Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.) told POLITICO. “He just said all EVs would be built in China. That is not fighting to keep America’s auto industry competitive in the global marketplace.”

UAW President Shawn Fain, for his part, has left no doubt that Trump doesn’t stand a chance of landing his union’s endorsement. In a statement, he said that “every fiber of our union is being poured into fighting the billionaire class and an economy that enriches people like Donald Trump at the expense of workers.”

But Trump was able to win over many rank-and-file union members in 2016, even as their leaders denied him endorsements. And behind the scenes, there has been tension between UAW and the White House in recent days.

Last week, during a speech on the UAW strike, Biden announced that he was sending White House senior adviser Gene Sperling and acting Labor Secretary Julie Su to Detroit. Their goal was to help the union and auto companies reach a contract, but they would not intervene, the Biden administration said.

But UAW officials were frustrated by Sperling and Su’s plans to head to Michigan, according to two people familiar with their thinking. Despite promises that they would not get involved or mediate, the union questioned what their exact role would be, the sources said.

Another source said there was also a concern among both UAW officials and companies about the timing of their planned visit. The trip, which was ultimately scrapped for at least this week, was set to come soon after the strike began.

Fain nodded to the tension on “Face the Nation” this past weekend. “People are talking about them trying to interject themselves into our — into our negotiations,” he said. “Our negotiators are fighting hard. Our leadership's fighting hard. It's going to be won at the negotiating table with our negotiating teams, with our members manning the picket lines and our allies out there. Who the president is now, who the former president was or the president before them, isn't going to win this fight.”

Asked about the Biden aides’ plans changing, a White House official said that “given that negotiations are ongoing between the negotiating parties, it is most productive for Sperling and Su to continue their discussions from Washington and allow talks to move forward, and we’ll continue to assess travel timing based on the active state of negotiations.”

Sperling has been in regular contact with union officials and businesses for more than two months, and that is expected to continue. Su is also in touch with both sides and has stepped up her outreach to members of Congress on the contract negotiations, including asking lawmakers for their opinions.

While some of Biden’s allies are concerned by Trump’s visit to Detroit, other Democrats predicted it would flop.

“I think it backfires,” said. Rep. Dan Kildee (D-Mich.). “Autoworkers, they know their interests and they know who stands with them.”

Sam Stein and Brittany Gibson contributed to this report.

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UAW strike: Red-state govs take their shot

The United Auto Workers strike seemed to catch the White House and auto executives off guard.

Gov. Brian Kemp, the Georgia Republican, was not so surprised.

Kemp described the historic labor strike as a natural consequence of blue-state economic policies that are more supportive of union rights in an interview on Monday.

“People are fleeing their states because they just want to go where there’s a free market and good hard work,” Kemp said while en route to a ribbon cutting for a new Amazon distribution center in Savannah. That was particularly true, he said, in the electric vehicle industry; EV makers in states like Michigan, where the UAW is strong, have seen their rollout plans complicated by the strike.

The strike, he said, was happening in a world apart from his own. “We just haven’t been dealing with it in Georgia, because we’re a right-to-work state.”

The battle among governors for jobs, investment and economic growth — particularly along regional and political lines — has been one of the defining political stories of the last decade. Different parts of America have diverged in their social policies, tax rates, business regulations and more.

In a statement responding to Kemp’s remarks, a spokesperson for Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat, defended the state’s development record — and stressed the social values that blue-state leaders have used to draw a contrast with states like Georgia.

“The strength and vitality of Michigan’s economy depends in equal parts on our skilled and dedicated labor force, as well as the Big Three Automakers who are headquartered here. We’re hopeful all parties can come together during these negotiations,” said Stacey LaRouche. “People want to live and work in places where they know that their leaders and laws reflect their values.”

Yet as GOP chief executives scramble for more jobs — and the votes of rank-and-file union members, who have drifted more Republican in recent years — they have also tread more carefully, preferring to cast blame on Washington rather than the union that is, in some cases, picketing in their state.

“We would encourage both sides to come to the table with fair demands and realistic expectations and solve this issue before our state and national economy are negatively affected,” Missouri Gov. Michael Parson, a Republican, said in a statement to POLITICO. “We want people working and our state and economy moving forward.”

Last year, after the Supreme Court struck down the federal right to abortion, a group of liberal governors attempted to draw away investment from states like Georgia and Texas, arguing to companies that new restrictions in red states on access to abortion would turn away skilled workers. The tension between Democrats’ electric vehicle clean energy push and union jobs is just the latest front in that drama.

Of the three plants the UAW targeted in its initial strike list, only one is located in a so-called right-to-work state. However, that is slated to change shortly as Michigan Democrats earlier this year repealed the state’s right to work status — a major victory for labor unions — with the law taking effect in 2024.

Trump is hoping to capitalize on the internal Democratic tensions, planning a stop in Michigan at the end of the month in support of UAW workers and calling the EV push a “SCAM” on his social media platform, Truth Social.

But Trump’s comments aren’t widely embraced by everyone in the party. “President Trump’s anti-EV rhetoric will simply slow the growth and delay EV mainstream arrival maybe by a couple of years, but I don’t know that he can stop it,” said Tim Echols, a Republican who serves as vice chair of Georgia’s Public Service Commission, which regulates utilities in the state.

Kemp and other Republicans in the South have largely focused their opposition to President Joe Biden’s EV push on reliance on China and consumer choice. Kemp has pledged to make his state an EV manufacturing center, even as he casts doubts on climate change.

“We’ve got great automobile suppliers in the state now and we’re going to have more in the future, as you know, with Hyundai and Rivian coming,” Kemp said. “We’re not really having to go out and recruit the Big Three to come to Georgia. We got all the auto manufacturers that are competing against them that are already here.”

Of the 25 EV manufacturing facilities announced in Georgia since the passage of the bipartisan infrastructure law, just one — a Blue Bird electric school bus factory in Fort Valley, Ga. — has evidence of unionization, according to data from BlueGreen Alliance and Atlas Public Policy.

Kemp, and the rest of the Southeast, are benefitting from a larger trend of mostly foreign auto-makers investing away from Motown. There’s now more automotive manufacturing investment in the Southeast than the Great Lakes, according to the latest numbers from the Center for Automotive Research.

In addition to the multi-million dollar deals Georgia has with Rivian and Hyunda, Kia already operating a plant in the state. Toyota has two automobile plants running in Tennessee. And Volkswagen has plants in multiple Southern states — just to name a few manufacturers.

Governors saying any particular issue will help recruit companies is one thing, large companies actually uprooting entire operations is another. The decisions to open plants are often years in the making — and states’ recruitment pitches aren’t as simplistic as a red-versus-blue narrative that may play out in the halls of Congress or on the campaign trail.

Oklahoma, for example, highlights in their auto manufacturing recruitment push that it is a “right-to-work state” with “low unemployment insurance taxes.” But another bullet point from the state is the accessibility of charging stations, touting that “Oklahoma is home to the nation’s first comprehensive statewide network of public fast chargers” and that 35 percent of the state’s power comes from renewable energy.

“We have the manufacturing capability and workforce to make a great home for any company looking to make the move and our geographical location makes us a logical choice for any of these auto companies,” said Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt, a Republican, in a statement.

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U.K. Chancellor Jeremy Hunt defends China’s invitation to AI summit

The U.K. will invite China to participate only in limited portions of an artificial intelligence summit planned for later this year amid hesitation from the U.S. and other allies, U.K. Chancellor Jeremy Hunt told POLITICO Tech.

“We're not going to invite China to every single part of the summit," Hunt said, as he defended the decision to include Beijing despite widespread concerns about its use of AI technology for surveillance and suppression. He added that British officials intend “to be very open” about practices that “we don’t consider to be acceptable.”

“If you're trying to create structures that make AI something that overall is a net benefit to humanity, then you can't just ignore the second-biggest economy in the world,” Hunt said in an interview that will air Wednesday. “That doesn't mean that you make any kind of compromises with your values but sometimes dialogue can be beneficial.”

The summit, announced in June by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, is a U.K.-led effort to convene global tech leaders — and to position a post-Brexit nation in the center of the global debate about AI safety. Separate from both the EU and the U.S. regulatory conversations, the U.K. summit got a key endorsement from President Joe Biden, though Biden himself is reported not to be attending.

POLITICO previously reported that U.S. and EU officials would prefer China not be involved in the event, though National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson later said “the United States is fine with China attending the summit.”

Hunt’s remarks come as he is set to begin a tour of tech hubs along the U.S. West Coast on Wednesday that will include stops in Seattle, San Francisco and Los Angeles for meetings with the CEOs of Amazon, Microsoft and Google, among other major American players. He will also host a roundtable with video game companies, including Activision Blizzard, which has struggled to win U.K approval for its acquisition by Microsoft.

The U.K. aims to build on its existing startup community, which Hunt said is home to the most ventures in Europe valued over $1 billion, and ultimately become “as big as the mothership” Silicon Valley itself, he said. It plans to get there, in part, by striking a balance between regulation-heavy Europe and regulation-light U.S.

But some of the U.K.’s regulatory proposals, such as new digital competition rules, have garnered pushback from Big Tech firms. Investors have balked at perceived overreach by the country's antitrust regulator, which has derailed several Big Tech acquisitions in recent years. Meanwhile, Apple and Meta-owned WhatsApp have also signaled they would shutter services in the country over rules they say threaten user privacy.

“We will be very honest with the tech giants that I meet that we want a pro-innovation regulatory environment and that means an environment that works for thriving new startups and challengers,” Hunt said.

The U.K. specifically aims to plant a flag as a world leader in artificial intelligence. It’s already home to pioneering AI company DeepMind, which is owned by Google, and to a burgeoning hub of research and development in the field, along with other disciplines like life sciences and biotechnology, Hunt said, which he intended to use in his sales pitch to U.S. tech leaders.

“What I'll really be saying is, ‘Look, this is an incredibly exciting period in terms of tech development and we want to be a smart partner to you as you work out your expansion plans,’” Hunt told POLITICO Tech.

China’s likely participation in the November AI summit has been a source of tension for weeks. POLITICO first reported in late August that Beijing was likely to be invited and U.K. Foreign Secretary James Cleverly confirmed China’s involvement on Tuesday.

Hunt said including China is necessary if democratic nations hope to wield any influence over President Xi Jinping’s AI practices and avoid dividing the globe into different regulatory regimes for the rapidly evolving technology — a division that already exists with the internet as China has exerted increasing control.

“We recognize that the free-world democracies will want to go on a different journey when it comes to AI regulation, because we have different concerns about privacy and we will reflect that in the way that we go forward,” Hunt said.

“But there is a bigger question about China, which we all have to be honest about,” he continued. “China, despite the many things that we disagree with in that regime, is not going to go away. And the choice we have is, do we try and engage constructively where we can?”

Vincent Manancourt and Annie Rees contributed to this report.

To listen to the full interview with Hunt and other tech leaders, subscribe to POLITICO Tech on Apple, Spotify, Google or wherever you get your podcasts.

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The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict explained

Just three years on from a brutal war between Armenia and Azerbaijan, the simmering conflict again threatens to explode.

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Biden urges UN: Stand united with Ukraine

NEW YORK — President Joe Biden denounced Russian aggression in front of the world on Tuesday, taking to the United Nations to deliver an urgent call to rally around Ukraine — a pressing message aimed both at global partners and to those at home.

Biden hit many of the same notes as he did a year ago from the same New York rostrum, but from a dramatically changed backdrop. Last year, a Ukrainian counteroffensive had met with astounding success and aid to Kyiv flowed freely. Now, Ukraine’s latest ground push is stalling and, with a U.S. presidential election looming, House Republicans have threatened to slash aid to the war-torn country.

“No nation wants this war to end more than Ukraine. Russia alone bears responsibility, has power to end war, and stands in the way of peace,” Biden said. “Russia believes that the world will grow weary and allow it to brutalize Ukraine without consequence.”

The president declared the U.N. must “stand up to this naked aggression,” drawing applause from many in attendance, including Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who will address the assembly later to seek aid for his battered nation.

But the speech also differed from last year’s version in other ways. Biden’s call to stand with Ukraine came nearly 20 minutes into his address, and he showcased a foreign policy vision that extended far beyond the war zone. He spent much of his remarks focused on the developing world, returning to his long-running theme to rally democracies against the globe’s rising autocracies. On Tuesday, he went further, implicitly urging developing nations to turn their backs on Russia and China’s autocracies and join an inter-connected, rules-based order promoted by the U.S. and its allies.

“The United States seeks a more secure, more prosperous, more equitable world for all people, because we know our future is bound up with yours,” Biden said. “And no nation can meet the challenges of today alone.”

Biden, in his third speech to the general assembly, cited his country's own comeback from the pandemic as an example that “democracies can deliver in the ways that matter to people’s lives.” He vowed to foster international cooperation to press for solutions on sweeping challenges like climate change, equitable development, artificial intelligence and global health.

Ukraine remained a focus. The president hammered that point home from the U.N. rostrum, calling for the continent to stiffen its resolve as the U.S. continues to funnel billions of dollars of weapons and supplies to the Ukrainian resistance. Biden framed the battle as a rivalry between democracies and autocracies, but also pushed non-democracies to stand with the West against Russia.

Biden’s speech was equally directed to ears in Washington, where Republicans have called for slashing money being sent to the war zone. House GOP leaders, on Sunday night, introduced a government funding bill without any aid for Ukraine.

Donald Trump, expected to again become the GOP presidential nominee, has questioned the need to back Ukraine and repeated a desire to broker a peace deal with Russia quickly. Officials on both sides of the Atlantic assess that Putin is trying to wait out the upcoming U.S. election, believing that his fortunes in the war could change if a Republican commands from the Oval Office.

Congress has already approved $113 billion in aid for Ukraine including around $70 billion for security assistance; more than 90 percent of it has already been spent or assigned. The latest White House request includes $13.1 billion for military aid to Ukraine and replenishment of Pentagon weapons supplies that have been used for the war effort.

Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, skipped the general assembly, as did China’s Xi Jinping, but Beijing’s presence loomed large on the east side of Manhattan. Much of Biden’s speech read as a pitch to the developing world, highlighting democratic efforts that have helped nations like Vietnam and Haiti, as well as ongoing global infrastructure projects. But its true subject was China, although the president tried to publicly downplay tensions with Beijing, as he did just weeks ago at the G20.

“None of these partnerships are about containing any other country,” said Biden. “We seek to responsibly manage the competition between our countries.”

He was scheduled to meet later Tuesday with the leaders of five Central Asian nations — Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz Republic, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan — all nations that border Russia or China.

Biden’s moment on the global stage came amid swirling domestic political worries.

The president has been grappling with possibly sweeping economic consequences of the United Auto Workers strike as well as ongoing fallout from the indictment of his son, Hunter, and an impeachment inquiry from Congress. His reelection bid also is top of mind — and its likely rematch against Trump.

And the clock is ticking toward a government shutdown at the end of the month, an outcome that White House aides would largely be blamed on Republicans — but still holds political risk for the president.

Still, the White House has leaned into Biden’s image as a global statesman, using it as proof of his leadership — and to highlight the revitalization of coalitions left damaged by Trump, his predecessor — as well as his vitality. Biden’s secret trip to Kyiv earlier this year was made into a recent campaign ad designed as a subtle rebuke to critics who believe the 80-year-old president is too frail to do the job.

The absence of the heavyweights from New York also, White House aides acknowledged, furthered the impression that the United Nations, though still a glitzy gathering of global diplomacy, has been diminished as a place to enact real change.

While in New York, Biden will also hold a meeting with the U.N. secretary-general, attend a labor event with President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil and host world leaders for a reception at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Biden is also expected to meet Wednesday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the sidelines of the gathering, denying the right-wing leader the White House visit he wanted in the wake of a judicial reform that Biden has denounced as anti-democratic. Many in the White House have grown wary of Netanyahu’s leadership even as they may use the Turtle Bay meetings to push for a normalization of relations between longtime foes Israel and Saudi Arabia.

And once more mixing in the needs of domestic politics, he will attend several campaign fundraisers.

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