MNI POLITICAL RISK ANALYSIS – US Daily Brief 18-03-22

Executive summary:

• The Russian invasion of Ukraine has pushed further into the West of the country. A missile strike has targeted L’viv, a city which has been largely insulated from violence, bringing the war closer to the border of the EU and NATO.
• 9:00 ET 13:00 GMT: President Biden will hold a call with Chinese President Xi Jinping. The call follows a seven-hour meeting between US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan and his Chinese counterpart Yang Jiechi in Rome earlier this week.
• Biden will push Xi to act as a mediator in the war as there is a widely held belief that Xi is one of the few world leaders in a position to persuade Russian President Vladimir Putin to change course.
• Yesterday, US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin gave a joint press conference in Bratislava with Slovakia's defence minister Jaroslav Nad. They confirmed that talks were underway on providing Soviet designed S300 missile defence systems to Ukraine.
• The House of Representatives yesterday passed a bill to revoke favoured trade relations with Russia and Belarus. The bill passed almost unanimously but there is a lack of clarity about how exactly Congress will proceed on legislation. It is also unclear whether legislation is necessary, or desirable, considering President Biden's executive ban on Russian oil last week.
• Senator Joe Manchin (D-WV): ‘I don’t know what they’re even doing, why they’re even doing it. It makes no sense at all. The president has the authority to do it. He did what he’s going to do. I trust him to do it.’
• The Senate will continue debate on the America COMPETES Act which seeks to invest and boost the US high tech sector and mitigate US dependency on China. Both the House-passed and Senate versions of the bill include USD$52 billion in grants and incentives for semiconductor manufacturers.
• Poll of the Day: 'Divided', 'confused', 'chaos', 'mess', and 'lost' are among the most common words used to describe the country, according to a Monmouth University poll.

MNI POLITICAL RISK ANALYSIS – US Daily Brief 18-03-22 .pdf