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The Weekly GAB - Friday, October 27, 2017
U.S. Global Leadership Coalition | www.usglc.org
http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=DEmcbfQSAS0RuQkvAvertg

Who's in the News

CNN
Nikki Haley: This Is Why the President Is Sending Me to Africa

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=yvrQ1Fy3kw5uN8Xf6bAszQ

Nikki Haley, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations

The United States has many interests in these war-torn African
countries. Our interests are certainly humanitarian, but they are also
economic and strategic. Throughout the world, we have seen that
desperate situations can lead to dangerous results. For this reason,
President Donald Trump recently asked me to travel to the region to
get a first-hand picture of what can be done. I will also visit
Ethiopia -- which hosts both the headquarters of the African Union and
one of the largest communities of South Sudanese refugees in the
world.

THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE
The Indispensable Role of America in the World

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=_Zg7ClTmT_M4eDrbfYjVPg

Former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) and Rep. Chris Stewart
(R-UT)

We partnered Friday to organize an event at the Utah State Capitol to
discuss the critical leadership role that the United States plays
globally and to highlight Utah's longstanding commitment and
contributions to this leadership. Whether rebuilding Europe and Asia
following the devastation of World War Two, promoting economic and
political freedoms throughout the Cold War or responding to the
scourges of hunger and disease, the United States has embraced its
role as the leading force for good in the world both as a strategy to
protect and advance our national interests and as a demonstration of
American values and compassion.

THE SEATTLE TIMES
How the U.S. Can Save Mothers and Children Across the Globe

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=zdyn7NhJrzpmovw4juUvhA

Congressman Dave Reichert (R-WA)

Doing more to save the lives of mothers and children around the world
will further establish America's moral leadership and help
create a more stable, safer world. That's why I am proud to
reintroduce a bipartisan bill along with Reps. Betty McCollum,
D-Minnesota, Daniel Donovan, R-New York, and Barbara Lee,
D-California, that would do just that - the Reach Every Mother
and Child (Reach) Act. The Reach Act would greatly improve the rate at
which moms and kids survive, and it would put us that much closer to
the global commitment of ending all preventable deaths in the next
generation globally.

Development & Diplomacy

THE WASHINGTON POST

World Leaders Rehearse for a Pandemic That Will Come 'Sooner
Than We Expect' |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=CF3zn9RfvQnNoKhYEoBf0Q

Lena H. Sun

That scenario was part of a pandemic simulation held during the World
Bank's annual meeting in Washington this month. It's not
the kind of event that people would typically associate with the World
Bank. But it's the fourth such exercise the bank has helped
organize in the past year, reflecting what experts say is the growing
awareness outside the traditional global health sector of the
increasing threat and economic disruption posed by a global pandemic.
Although there is more awareness about the issue, experts agree that
the world is not prepared for the next pandemic. "We still are
not ready for the big one...We're frankly not ready for a
medium-sized one. The threat is still out there."

THE ATLANTIC
The Deadly Panic-Neglect Cycle in Pandemic Funding |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=mMZJQuUHkwWu_ozPIpq4Bw

Ed Yong

In a world in which someone with a deadly virus can fly to any other
continent in less than a day, the United States is connected to the
entire planet's diseases. And so, to protect itself, it must
protect everyone else..."If your desire is to keep disease out
of your country, the best way to do that is to contain it at the
source." In the years since the Ebola outbreak, the United
States has channeled billions toward this goal, and has led other
countries in doing the same. But some of that funding is set to
disappear. This is a common pattern with epidemics. Diseases flare up
and we throw money and resources and troops at them. The crisis ends
and peacetime brings complacency.

THE HILL
Head of OPIC Says It's Here to Stay |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=XuqhL_YMPnXCxvgyMsDP1w

Vicki Needham

Ray Washburne is hitting the ground running in his new job leading the
Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC), which only a handful
of months ago faced termination under President Trump's proposed
budget. "I have the full support of the White House,"
Washburne said during a recent interview in his OPIC office...Senate
budget legislation would provide the agency with $79 million for
fiscal 2018, a boost from $68 million this year, a sign that his
frequent meetings on Capitol Hill hawking its merits are paying off.
Washburne says his funding is secure and the agency is fully staffed
and ready to lend.

BLOOMBERG
How Rex Tillerson Is Remaking the State Department |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=17H-RRPjjqGo3mSUSpZ_rw

Nick Wadhams

Instead of focusing all his attention outward, though, Tillerson has
indicated that some of his top priorities are more inward-looking. He
wants to cut costs and reorganize the department, in part to meet a
White House goal of reducing the agency's budget by 30 percent.
In the eight months since he took over, Tillerson has spent
considerable time immersed in the minutiae of head counts and
organizational charts while ensconced in his executive suite on the
seventh floor of the Harry S Truman Building, where he sat for an
interview with Bloomberg Businessweek on Oct. 19.

POLITICO
Leaked Document Shows Tillerson Power Play |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=3g0z4uffo1sD7BMZIkGc0Q

Nahal Toosi

A leaked State Department document is alarming diplomats and others
who say it shows the accumulation of power among a small and
unaccountable group of senior aides to Secretary of State Rex
Tillerson. The chart, obtained by POLITICO, illustrates the growing
influence of the State Department's Policy Planning Staff, which
traditionally has served as an in-house think tank but which Tillerson
heavily relies upon for day-to-day decision making. Critics already
complain that the office - led by Brian Hook, a powerful
Tillerson aide not subject to Senate confirmation - accepts too
little input from career diplomats, and the chart, which lays out a
method to craft foreign policy, shows no explicit role for them.

THE HILL
Pence Says US to Stop Funding 'Ineffective' UN Relief Efforts |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=bZ_tmeMT0otHuKgER_pvfg

Max Greenwood

Vice President Pence on Wednesday said that President Trump has
instructed the State Department to stop funding certain "ineffective"
United Nations relief efforts and to instead provide humanitarian
assistance directly through USAID and "faith-based groups." In a
speech at the In Defense of Christians annual Solidarity Dinner for
Christians in the Middle East, Pence excoriated the U.N., saying the
international body has "often failed to help the most vulnerable
communities especially religious minorities." "We will no longer rely
on the United Nations alone to assist persecuted Christians and
minorities in the wake of genocide and the atrocities of terrorist
groups," Pence said to applause.

CNN
Haley Gets First-Hand Look at South Sudan's Devastating Crisis |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=9dp7RW_ME7Ur0cB93PmLNA

Elise Labott, Khalil Abdallah

After getting a first-hand glimpse of the impact of South Sudan's
brutal civil war, US Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said
the US bears an important responsibility to push for an end to the
conflict. Haley, the first Cabinet-level official in the Trump
administration to go to sub-Saharan Africa, visited a refugee camp in
Ethiopia's western region of Gambella on the border with South Sudan.
Nearly 400,000 refugees have fled to Gambella, outnumbering even the
local population. It was her first visit to Africa, and Haley was
visibly moved by what she saw.

Politics & Foreign Policy

DEVEX
Steve Bannon: Trump Is Not an Isolationist |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=bWSnoObXJ2i6z4hHvXei9g

Michael Igoe

Steve Bannon, the controversial former White House chief strategist
and co-founder of Breitbart, rejected the idea that President Donald
Trump's "America first" foreign policy is
isolationist during an event on Monday, while also deriding the
"geniuses in the foreign policy elite" and taking aim at
U.S. "nation building" efforts. In Bannon's
description of Trump's foreign policy views, the difference
between this administration and past ones is that Trump - and
Bannon - do not want to see the United States occupying another
seat at the table on a broad range of issues, but instead pressing for
specific national security interests alongside partners that share
those specific interests.

DEFENSE ONE
A Tale of Two Speeches |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=RXLnyTXHV-8nZ4EnPsXimA

Richard Fontaine

Sen. McCain and former President Bush called for Americans to rise to
global leadership, and underscored the concrete benefits that have
accrued from it. In normal times, this would be unexceptional. What
made these two speeches so extraordinary was just how unexceptional
their message would have been at any other time in recent decades.
Bush called for "the projection of American leadership,"
and for "America's role in sustaining and defending an
international order rooted in freedom and free markets." McCain
observed that maintaining that global leadership "has had its
costs, but we have become incomparably powerful and wealthy" by
doing so. "We would not thrive in a world where our leadership
and ideals are absent," McCain added. "We wouldn't
deserve to."

THE NEW YORK TIMES

Tillerson Visits Iraq to Chilly Reception Over His Remarks on
Iran-Backed Militias |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=JyVI22-uKlA_FW0_SCwZwg

Gardiner Harris

Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson slipped into Iraq Monday after
having spent the morning in Afghanistan, but his welcome in Baghdad
was far less effusive as the Trump administration pushes to isolate
Iran, an important Iraqi ally. The diplomatic challenges for the
United States in Iraq have become a minefield of competing interests
as the Islamic State surrenders the last of its Iraqi territory and a
host of squabbling groups fight to fill the vacuum. After meeting with
Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi of Iraq, Mr. Tillerson called for unity
in the country, long troubled by sectarian and tribal divisions.

THE WASHINGTON POST

The Most Popular Parlor Game in Washington: Who Will Replace
Tillerson? |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=EUq_MhK5ULihxqofJKrMTQ

Josh Rogin

The most popular parlor game in Washington right now is speculating
who will replace Rex Tillerson as President Trump's next
secretary of state, a thankless job in an administration that has
downgraded the role of the State Department and diplomacy overall. But
two qualified and apparently willing candidates have emerged. As
several excruciating profiles have detailed, Tillerson's main
legacy will likely be a State Department depleted of talent, with the
lowest morale in decades and playing a reduced role in the crafting
and implementation of U.S. foreign policy. His successor's
primary mission will be to reverse that trend. The top two contenders,
Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley and CIA Director Mike
Pompeo, offer different paths for recovery.

FOREIGN POLICY
State Department Scraps Sanctions Office |

http://action.usglc.org/site/R?i=EcHg_11zyxcwYtb0yJmrKA

Robbie Gramer, Dan De Luce

The State Department shuttered an office that oversees sanctions
policy, even as the Donald Trump administration faced criticism from
lawmakers over its handling of new economic penalties against Russia.
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson eliminated the Coordinator for
Sanctions Policy office, which had been led by a veteran
ambassador-rank diplomat with at least five staff, as part of an
overhaul of the department, former diplomats and congressional sources
told Foreign Policy. Instead, the role of coordinating U.S. sanctions
across the State Department and other government agencies now falls to
just one mid-level official - David Tessler, the deputy director
of the Policy Planning Office.


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