US President Joe Biden took a break last week for a nearly two-hour private history lesson from a group of academics who highlighted concerns about the precarious state of democracy at home and abroad, the Washington Post reported on Wednesday.
The conversation on August 4 supposedly took the form of a philosophical dialogue between the president and a small group of scholars who painted the current period as among the most dangerous in modern history for democratic governance.
According to the publication's sources familiar with the discussion, comparisons were drawn between the period leading up to the 1940 election, when President Franklin Roosevelt struggled with domestic pro-fascist sentiment and opposition to the US' entry into World War II, and the years before the 1860 election, when Abraham Lincoln issued the proverbial warning that a "house divided against itself cannot stand."
The detour reportedly was part of Biden's ongoing strategy to consult outside experts in secret White House sessions to assist him in formulating his strategy for dealing with the many issues his presidency is currently experiencing.
For such a purpose, in a May conversation, Biden and former president Bill Clinton discussed how to handle inflation and the midterm elections. Also, before Russia launched its special military operation in Ukraine, a group of foreign policy specialists, including former Republican advisers, briefed Biden at the White House in January.
These meetings have reportedly taken place as Biden struggles with the isolation that comes with being president. According to undisclosed Democrats, quoted by the outlet, this issue has been made worse by the COVID-19 pandemic, which severely curtailed travel during much of his first year in office, and by the exclusive nature of Biden's inner circle, which is made up of staffers who have worked with him for years.
Participants of those meetings reportedly claimed that Biden frequently spends hours debating issues and vetting theories during these roundtable discussions in order to understand things better. Before the events in Ukraine and before Biden's meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Geneva in 2021, Michael McFaul, a former American ambassador to Russia under President Barack Obama, claimed to have briefed Biden alongside other analysts.
"They get out of their bubble,” McFaul is quoted as saying. "I worked at the White House for three years before going to Moscow, and comparatively I think they do that in a much more strategic way than we used to do in the Obama administration. It feels that they are more engaged."
Remote History Lesson
Over the past few months, Biden has held discussions with many current and former analysts, and even presidents such as Bill Clinton.
But on this occasion, Biden reportedly welcomed historians to the White House who, in general, have a longer perspective and are able to situate his presidency within the context of US history since its establishment.
Biden, who is 79 years old and has personally witnessed the work of nine presidents, beginning with Richard Nixon, has supposedly hinted that he has given the subject some attention.
This is said to be a part of a routine effort that extends at least as far back as the Reagan administration, and a group of presidential historians gathered in the White House Map Room last week to inform the president of their expert opinions. Such meetings reportedly lost appeal under Trump, but Obama had frequently convened them.
The meeting is said to be notable for its modest size and the participants' attention to the global development of totalitarianism and the dangers facing domestic democracy. Among the participants were presidential historian Michael Beschloss, journalist Anne Applebaum, Princeton professor Sean Wilentz, University of Virginia historian Allida Black, and Biden's occasional speechwriter Jon Meacham. Anita Dunn, a senior adviser in the White House, and Vinay Reddy, the chief speechwriter, were also present.
As he sat two stories above in the Treaty Room, a portion of the White House residence, Biden, who was still testing positive for COVID-19, was present via video conference. Senior adviser Mike Donilon also made an appearance on the screen, according to the report.
The sources claimed that Biden largely used the discussion to listen and reflect on the bigger backdrop of how his term is developing. However, he did not offer any significant declarations or outline his future goals.
"A lot of the conversation was about the larger context of the contest between democratic values and institutions and the trends toward autocracy globally," the person said.
After the January 6 riot at the US Capitol, the ongoing denial of the 2020 election results by certain Republicans, and the efforts of election deniers to run for office, the majority of the professionals in attendance were vocal about the threats they perceive to the American democratic process.
Moreover, a portion of last week's conversation centered on the parallels between the current environment and the years preceding World War II, when authoritarianism abroad found an echo in the US. Back then, the Reverend Charles Coughlin utilized his radio program to disseminate a populist anti-Semitic message across the nation during the 1930s, along with the brief rise in popularity of the American Nazis, while leaders like Adolf Hitler of Germany and Benito Mussolini of Italy solidified their power.
'Outside-the-Box Thinking'
According to the report, McFaul was a member of a group that met in the East Room earlier this year to discuss Ukraine. The president reportedly began with a few quick remarks and then spent around two hours asking questions as some participants, such as McFaul and retired Adm. James G. Stavridis, a former Supreme Allied Commander of NATO, appeared remotely on a screen.
"They really wanted outside-the-box thinking of, is there any way that this war, which will be horrible for everyone involved, can be stopped? Can we stop it? How can we stop it?” Bremmer said. "All of my interactions [with the White House] in the last few years have been uniformly open, constructive and really wanting to get my best sense of where they’re getting it right and where they’re not."
According to Andrew Bates, a spokesperson for the White House quoted in the report, the president "values hearing from a wide range of experts."
As noted, Biden launched his 2020 campaign with the claim that there was a "battle for the soul of the nation." And according to his inner circle, Biden's concerns about anti-democratic trends have long motivated him.
If Biden decides to run for reelection, Democrats generally anticipate that the same themes will guide his campaign, especially if Trump runs as his opponent once more.