A look ahead at the key events leading the news agenda next week, from the team at Foresight News. Delivered to your inbox on Fridays.
Leading the week
With the midterms less than 70 days away, President Joe Biden has a busy week ahead, starting on Monday (September 5) with Labor Day trips to the battleground states of Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. Wisconsin has key gubernatorial and senate races this fall, with Democratic Governor Tony Evers seeking reelection and Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes hoping to unseat Republican Senator Ron Johnson, and Biden is expected to throw his weight behind their campaigns when he visits Milwaukee on Monday. Biden’s Pittsburgh visit, meanwhile, will be mark his third trip to the Keystone State in recent days, a clear signal of how pivotal the state is likely to be come November. Having skipped Biden’s event in Wilkes-Barre this week, Democratic senate nominee John Fetterman is due to march alongside Biden at the city’s Labor Day Parade.
On Tuesday (September 6) Biden will be back at the White House for a celebration marking the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act back in August, a sweeping spending package viewed by Democrats as a landmark legislative accomplishment. On Wednesday (September 7), Biden hosts his former boss Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle to unveil their official White House portraits. The event comes after what many criticized as a graceless snub by Donald Trump in deciding to break with the tradition of hosting his predecessor for their portrait unveiling.
Biden is on the road again on Friday (September 9) visiting Ohio, another key battleground state. The president will use his trip to the Buckeye state to attend a groundbreaking ceremony for a new Intel computer-chip manufacturing facility and promote the recently-passed CHIPS Act, which subsidizes US semiconductor production and research. He’ll be joined there by Rep. Tim Ryan, the Democratic nominee in the open senate race against Hillbilly Elegy author J.D. Vance, one of the most closely-watched races of this cycle.
Looking abroad
Monday (September 5) marks the 50th anniversary of Munich massacre, when 11 Israeli athletes and a West German police officer were killed after Palestinian militants affiliated with Black September group managed to enter the Olympic Village during the 1972 Summer Games, taking the athletes hostage before a botched rescue operation at Fürstenfeldbruck Air Base led to a bloodbath. Israeli President Isaac Herzog is in Germany to mark the grim anniversary, which follows news this week that families of the victims have at last reached a €28 million compensation agreement with Germany. Herzog is due to attend a service at Fürstenfeldbruck on Monday afternoon alongside his German counterpart Frank-Walter Steinmeier, and will deliver an address in the German Bundestag on Tuesday morning. Herzog’s trip comes ahead of a visit by Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid, who is due to arrive in Germany on Sunday (September 11) before heading to New York for the UN General Assembly later this month.
The UK Conservative Party’s leadership contest comes to an end on Monday (September 5) with the announcement of Boris Johnson’s successor, who will also take over as prime minister. Foreign Secretary Liz Truss and former chancellor Rishi Sunak have spent the past two months criss-crossing the nation to woo the party faithful, and most polls show Truss enjoying a comfortable lead. The winner is announced around lunchtime in the UK, kickstarting what will then be a hectic first week in power, including a visit to The Queen in Scotland on Tuesday (September 6) to be officially invited to form a new government. The new prime minister is expected to make a speech at Downing Street that afternoon before pressing on with key Cabinet appointments. Once their first parliamentary appearance has been navigated on Wednesday (September 7), the new administration is expected to turn its attention quickly to a series of measures to tackle the cost-of-living crisis and spiraling energy bills, including a potential fiscal event within weeks. The prime minister may also make early moves to establish themselves on the international stage – the UNGA debate looks like a likely first foreign visit, unless a trip to Ukraine can be squeezed in first to show continuity in the UK’s commitment.
Lastly, keep an eye out for an intervention next week from Russian President Vladimir Putin, who speaks at the Eastern Economic Forum on Wednesday (September 7) in Vladivostok. This year’s forum is themed On the Path to a Multipolar World, and Putin may well use his speech to expand on his framing of the conflict in Ukraine as the result of US efforts to maintain its global hegemony, which he has also tied to tensions over Taiwan and elsewhere.