In 1998, the groundbreaking African-American novelist Toni Morrison controversially called Bill Clinton “our first black president.”
Morrison meant it metaphorically, suggesting that black Americans could relate to Clinton’s background and treatment by his political opponents. More than a decade later, in 2011, New York magazine called Barack Obama America’s “first Jewish president” for a story on his troubled relations with Israel, but strong ties with the American Jewish community.
Now, the United States has elected a new president: Joseph Biden, Obama’s former vice president. By these standards, he could easily be labeled America’s “first Ukrainian president” for his deep knowledge of Ukraine and experience facing the kind of “black PR” attacks common in the country’s dirtiest political struggles.
As Obama’s point person on the country, Biden forcefully pushed for reforms and action on anti-corruption — and pro-reform Ukrainians hope he can repeat that performance as president.
But Ukrainian leaders should not be naïve. While Biden’s election is positive news for Ukraine, he will have no illusions about the country and its limited lack of progress. He knows Ukraine too well.
Engaged in Ukraine
Since 1991, there has never been a U.S. leader with more experience in Ukraine.
In eight years as vice president, Biden made six visits to Ukraine, five of them after the 2014 EuroMaidan Revolution, which ousted corrupt President Viktor Yanukovych.
In February 2014, following violent crackdowns on the EuroMaidan protesters, Biden called Yanukovych by phone and told him that it was time for him to “walk away” from power. According to the president-elect’s memoir, the Ukrainian president fled the country the very next day.
After the revolution, Biden was equally forceful.
In 2016, he pressured the Ukrainian government to fire Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin, threatening to withhold over $1 billion in U.S. loan guarantees if the official kept his job. Shokin was widely believed to be sabotaging corruption cases, and Ukrainian civil society and the country’s Western partners wanted him gone.
Biden got his way, and Shokin got the boot.
But the vice president’s role in this saga would later come back to haunt him. In the runup to the 2020 U.S. presidential election, Biden’s opponents in Washington and Kyiv alleged that he had wanted Shokin fired to protect his son from corruption investigations. The younger Biden sat on the board of directors of Burisma Holdings, a private energy company owned by former Ukrainian Ecology Minister Mykola Zlochevsky, from 2014–2019.
International media, including the Kyiv Post, repeatedly disproved these claims as patently false. Still, many believed them — including Trump. He tried to suspend nearly $400 million in defense aid to pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky into opening a politically motivated investigation into Biden. That led to Trump’s impeachment, but not his removal from office.
But anti-Biden conspiracy theories would also shed light on the VP’s powerful relationship with Ukraine. Earlier this year, Ukrainian lawmaker Andriy Derkach — whom U. S. Intelligence deems a “Russian agent” — began releasing what he claimed were audio recordings of phone conversations in which Biden pressured then-Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko to fire Shokin for his own corrupt aims.
The conversations — which seemed real, albeit selectively edited — didn’t offer any evidence of corruption. But they did present an interesting image of Biden: a U.S. vice president deeply engaged in Ukrainian policy issues, pushing for a bad official to be ousted and negotiating with Poroshenko, who, by contrast, seemed subservient and eager to please.
Some pro-reform Ukrainians would like to see Biden repeat this powerful performance.
Limits of hope
After four years of Trump, a president who seemed to openly hate Ukraine, Biden’s election is indeed a chance for a fresh start.
But those pro-reform Ukrainians who want to see Biden give other Ukrainian officials the Shokin treatment should take a deep breath and recognize that their hopes are unrealistic.
Biden will take office at a time when COVID‑19 is the dominant issue in the United States. After a year of Washington mismanaging the pandemic under Trump, he will need to direct government efforts to combat the spread of the virus and get the struggling American economy back on its feet. This will likely limit his focus on foreign policy.
Meanwhile, Ukraine is backsliding on reforms. Its Constitutional Court has issued several rulings that threaten to reverse its anti-corruption reforms — Ukraine’s biggest accomplishments since 2014. If they go, expect International Monetary Fund aid and, potentially, Ukraine’s visa-free regime with the European Union to follow.
Men hold posters that read “Shokin covers up corruption, the president covers up Shokin” and “We demand an independent prosecutor general” as they attend a rally against then-Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin and his predecessors on March 28, 2016. (Volodymyr Petrov)
Is now the time, as some Ukrainians hope, for Biden to swoop in and save an increasingly needy Ukraine from itself? Dream on.
Ukrainians should remember that Biden isn’t a novice at this game. He knows Ukrainian politics and its wily political operators well. And he has experienced firsthand how difficult it is to reform this country.
Moreover, Ukraine is no longer just pulling itself to its feet in the wake of EuroMaidan and the Russian invasion. In the past two years, it has held the full cycle of elections — presidential, parliamentary and local. These votes have further cemented Ukraine’s status as an electoral democracy, but yielded mixed results.
We have seen Zelensky offer up enormous promises of reform, but fail to deliver on most of them. We’ve witnessed pro-Russian, oligarch-owned forces unite across party lines to derail and sabotage reforms. They’ve turned the country’s highest, least accountable judicial institution — the Constitutional Court — into a weapon of governmental mass destruction.
Biden’s support for Ukraine’s reform efforts and its battle with Russia in the Donbas will undoubtedly remain strong. But, at this point, Ukraine needs him far more than he needs it.
Ukraine’s leaders must realize that Biden is not the solution to their problems. With America stretched thinner than ever, Biden will be happy to mete out tough love to a recalcitrant Kyiv.
But all hope is not lost. To unlock the full potential of the Biden presidency, Ukraine’s leadership must start solving the country’s problems on its own. Begin with the corrupt courts and continue from there.
If Zelensky wants the Biden administration to actively support the country and spend its already scarce resources on Ukraine, show the U.S. why that’s a good investment.
Matthew Kupfer is news editor of the Kyiv Post.
