'Knife-edge election': On foreign policy, Harris remains 'coy' while Trump makes 'wild' statements

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00:00With the hours ticking away to Election Day in the US, both candidates are pushing their

00:09closing messages.

00:10Donald Trump campaigned in three different battleground states on Sunday, Pennsylvania,

00:15North Carolina and Georgia.

00:17The Republican repeated promises to carry out more oil drilling, suggested his opponents

00:22were already committing election fraud, and made a comment about journalists being shot,

00:27which his team later sought to play down.

00:30Kamala Harris, meanwhile, set her focus on Michigan, and for her final rally of the day,

00:34she made a pitch to the state's significant Arab-American community, pledging to do everything

00:40in her power to end the war in Gaza if elected president.

00:43Let's take a listen to the candidates.

00:46I have a piece of glass over here, and I don't have a piece of glass there, and I have a

00:57piece of glass here, but all we have really over here is the fake news, right?

01:09And to get me, somebody would have to shoot through the fake news, and I don't mind that

01:19so much.

01:20I don't mind.

01:21Here we are on the Sunday before the election, and I would ask, in particular, people who

01:29have not yet voted to not fall for his tactic, which I think includes suggesting to people

01:38that if they vote, their vote won't matter, suggesting to people that somehow the integrity

01:43of our voting system is not intact, so that they don't vote.

01:49Well, let's get some more analysis on the US presidential race now.

01:53For that, we can bring in Dr Christopher Featherstone, who's an Associate Lecturer at the University

01:58of York's Department of Politics and International Relations.

02:01Thank you very much for speaking to France 24.

02:05Thank you very much for having me.

02:06You have a focus on US foreign policy, so let's start off with some of the big topics

02:11that divide the candidates in this area.

02:13First of all, the war in Gaza.

02:15The Biden administration's handling of the war means that many Democrats could maybe

02:20not vote to vote for Trump or the Greens candidate.

02:23How significant a role is this issue playing in the vote?

02:27Well, I think this is a knife-edge election, and actually, we need to acknowledge this

02:32when we make any claim about foreign policy or any typical issue that might arise in a

02:38US election, and this time is no different.

02:41I would say that this is one of those issues where it will divide certain communities far

02:47more than it would for other groups.

02:50So I would say that this election, the Arab-American, the Muslim-American vote is so important,

02:58given that it is such a knife-edge election, that the Democrat campaign will not want any

03:03vote splitting at all.

03:05So we can definitely see that this is an issue that would be very important, and actually

03:10this is an issue that Harris has not really addressed all that competently previously.

03:14So actually, this is quite a refreshing move from a Democrat for Democratic voters.

03:20I think that this would probably speak to a group who feel an issue has been underrepresented

03:25in the election campaign so far.

03:27So it's a big one.

03:29Whether it's too little too late, I'm not sure, but it's certainly a very significant issue.

03:35When it comes to Trump, Trump has referred to telling Netanyahu to do whatever he needs

03:41to do, and therefore he's unlikely to get much support from the Muslim-American and

03:48the Arab-American vote.

03:51But Trump has also said that, along with the war in Ukraine, he would end the war in Gaza.

03:56What implications for Washington's relationship with Israel would that have?

04:04Well, the Biden administration has had an incredibly strong relationship with Israel.

04:09Biden is famously known for being incredibly pro-Israel, whereas Trump has a strong relationship

04:15with the Israeli state and with Netanyahu, but in a much less deep way, a much less enduring

04:23way.

04:24So there is a strong relationship there.

04:25Trump famously recognized Jerusalem as the capital, and therefore we can see that there

04:30probably would be a strong relationship with Israel.

04:33Unfortunately, on the other side, we would have a huge amount of controversy surrounding

04:38a lot of his proposed solutions.

04:41His proposed solution to the war in Ukraine is to negotiate without Ukraine being involved.

04:46So it might have a way of addressing the crisis, a way of trying to bring peace, but it would

04:52also exclude some key actors from involvement.

04:56So I think that it would have quite a detrimental impact on certain relationships and certain

05:01allies as well.

05:03And do you think Trump's promise to end the war in Ukraine, he said in a matter of hours,

05:08in fact, do you think that's achievable?

05:10And on the democratic side, in general, Harris had said that she would cut her own path away

05:16from the Biden administration.

05:19But on this issue of Ukraine and NATO, is it fairly predictable what she might pursue

05:24if she was elected?

05:27I would say, yes, it is relatively predictable what we might expect from Harris.

05:33But that is largely because we don't really know anything else.

05:36She hasn't really said what she would do, just that she would walk her own path.

05:41Well, that's fine.

05:42But we need to know what that might be.

05:44And Harris has been deliberately coy about referring to that, I would say.

05:48When it comes to Trump, I think the idea that he could end the war in Ukraine in hours is

05:53incredibly optimistic and at the same time incredibly unlikely.

05:57I think it's possible that we might see some bold comments from Trump in the first initial

06:03hours of becoming president.

06:05It's fairly typical for Trump to say some quite wild things.

06:08I would be shocked if it had any real impact on Putin and the war, unfortunately.

06:15Right. And Donald Trump has floated plans for tariffs on Chinese imports.

06:20But will China-U.S. relations remain strained no matter who's in the White House?

06:25Yes, I would say so.

06:27It is an issue that is likely to endure for years to come.

06:31So the Biden administration has maintained a lot of the tariffs that were already in

06:35place when they entered office.

06:37And I don't see Trump as likely to move any of those down or remove any of them.

06:43I think when it comes to U.S.-China relations, it is likely that China would have a more

06:48stable competition and more stable relationship with a Biden or a Harris administration than

06:55a Trump administration.

06:57But then you could also argue that Trump might be able to keep them destabilised and keep

07:00that relationship in a more nuanced manner because China would have to be trying to predict

07:07a rather unpredictable man in terms of foreign policy.

07:10All right, Dr. Christopher Featherstone, thank you very much for your analysis.

07:14We'll have to leave it there.

07:15Thank you very much.

07:17We'll, of course, be bringing you the U.S. election results as they come in.

07:20With plenty of analysis, you can check out our special programme from 6pm GMT on France24.

07:27That's 7pm Paris time and 1pm in Washington.

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