Biden adds a personal touch to Asia-Pacific diplomacy in his final months in office

WILMINGTON, Delaware. – President Joe Biden is looking to showcase the Indo-Pacific partnership he has cultivated since taking office when he hosts the leaders of Australia, Japan and India in his hometown on Saturday, while also keeping an eye on his own legacy.

When Biden entered the White House, he sought to transform the so-called Quad, which until then had only met at the level of foreign ministers, into a leadership-level partnership as he sought to steer U.S. foreign policy away from conflicts in the Middle East and toward threats and opportunities in the Indo-Pacific. This weekend's summit is the fourth in-person meeting of the leaders and sixth overall since 2021.

Biden added a personal touch to the meeting – possibly the group's last before he leaves office on Jan. 20 – by opening his home in Wilmington, Delaware, to each of the leaders and hosting a joint meeting and formal dinner at the high school he attended more than 60 years ago.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida attended the meetings ahead of their appearances at the United Nations General Assembly in New York next week.

“You've often heard the president say that all politics is personal, all diplomacy is personal,” White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters as the meetings were set to begin. “And developing personal relationships has been a central part of his foreign policy approach as president. So when he opens his home to the leaders of India, Japan and Australia, it's a way for him to show – not just say – that he cares about those leaders.”

On Friday afternoon, Biden welcomed Albanese to his home on a pond in a wooded area several miles west of downtown. On Saturday, he received Kishida and Modi there before convening all heads of state and government for consultations at Archmere Academy in nearby Claymont.

Sullivan described the atmosphere of the meeting with Albanese as “two guys – one in the other's house – talking in broad terms about how they see the state of the world.” He said Biden and Albanese also exchanged stories about their political careers.

Reporters and photographers were prohibited from covering Biden's one-on-one meetings with the heads of state and government. Biden also does not plan to hold a press conference – a question-and-answer appearance that is typical at such international summits.

At the summit, the heads of state and government wanted to announce new initiatives to strengthen maritime security in the region – including increased coast guard cooperation in the Pacific and Indian Oceans – and improved cooperation in humanitarian aid operations. The measures are intended to counterbalance an increasingly self-confident China.

Sullivan said he expected Biden and Modi to discuss Modi's recent visits to Russia and Ukraine, as well as economic and security concerns with China. Modi is the most prominent leader of a country that has taken a neutral stance toward the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Sullivan said Biden would stress “that countries like India should support the principles of sovereignty and territorial integrity” and that “every country, everywhere, should refrain from supplying supplies to Russia's war machine.”

The meeting is also an opportunity for Biden and Japan's Kishida to say goodbye to each other. Biden and Kishida, both of whom are leaving office due to declining popular support, view strengthening security and economic ties between the United States, Japan and South Korea as one of their most significant achievements.

The improvement in relations between Japan and South Korea – two nations with a long and complicated history that have struggled to talk to each other – has come against a backdrop of troubling developments in the Pacific, including North Korea's progress in its nuclear program and China's increasing assertiveness in the Pacific.

The US and Japan are negotiating at a time when tensions rarely arise in their relations with the US. Biden and presidential candidates Kamala Harris and Donald Trump have spoken out against a $15 billion takeover offer by the Japanese steel company Nippon Steel to take over the American steel company US Steel.

Biden administration officials indicated this week that the White House had not yet received a formal assessment of the proposed agreement by a U.S. government committee and that it might not do so until after the Nov. 5 election.

Sullivan dismissed speculation that the expected timing of the report's release might indicate that Biden had reconsidered his opposition to the agreement.

The Biden administration promised that the leaders would issue a joint statement containing the strongest language on China and North Korea that the four countries had ever agreed to.

The White House said the leaders would also make an announcement about Biden's Cancer Moonshot Initiative, a longtime passion project of the president and his wife, Jill Biden, that aims to reduce cancer deaths. Beau, the Bidens' son, died of brain cancer in 2015 at age 46.

As Biden's term comes to an end, the White House also celebrated the bipartisan, bicameral formation of a “Quad Caucus” in Congress to ensure the longevity of the partnership regardless of the outcome of the November election.

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Madhani reported from Washington