Vice President Kamala Harris would likely prioritize countering China and strengthening partnerships in the Indo-Pacific region if she were to win the White House, according to American political scientist Rush Doshi. As pundits speculate on what a Harris administration would look like, a recently released Democratic National Committee policy platform has garnered attention for featuring Europe at the top of its chapter on foreign affairs. However, speaking to CNBC's "Squawk Box Asia" on Wednesday, Doshi warned against interpreting the platform as a pivot from the Indo-Pacific to Europe. "People shouldn't read too much into the order in which things appear in the platform ... If you look at the record that Vice President Harris has as a senator and vice president, it shows pretty deep investment, involvement, engagement, and focus on the Indo-Pacific," said Doshi, senior fellow for Asia studies and China Strategy Initiative director at the Council on Foreign Relations.
It is also important to consider Harris' involvement in the Biden administration's foreign policy agenda, said Doshi. "[That administration] spent four years deeply involved in the Indo-Pacific with perhaps the most robust Indo-Pacific agenda of any administration, really, in decades," Doshi said. According to the political scientist, that agenda was particularly focused on building partnerships and alliances. Examples include AUKUS, a trilateral security partnership with Australia and the United Kingdom, and the Quad, a diplomatic partnership involving Australia, India, and Japan. Such partnerships have been seen as efforts to counter China's power and influence in the region.
