US would be wise not to trade away Biden team’s foreign policy expertise

Americans of all political stripes have reason to unite in celebration today after two American journalists, a former U.S. Marine and a U.S. resident and prominent Russian human rights advocate are back on U.S. soil as part of a prisoner exchange involving the United States, Russia, Belarus and Germany.

For the families of those returning home after years of being wrongfully detained, including former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan and Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, the prisoner swap marks the end of a yearslong saga of wondering if and when their loved ones would return home.

Their release rests largely on the shoulders of President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, who deftly negotiated a deal to rescue our citizens while doing minimal damage to the West — a deal that would not have been possible without the assistance and cooperation of German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and the Biden administration’s strong relationships with our allies in Europe.

While we celebrate the return of these hostages, we must also reflect on the evil nature of Vladimir Putin and other authoritarian leaders, and the potential threat of a Putin lackey like Donald Trump once again occupying the White House. After all, the outcome of this situation — a situation created entirely by Putin — could have been far more tragic.

Earlier this year, Russian opposition leader and political prisoner Alexei Navalny died under mysterious circumstances while in a Russian penal colony in the Arctic Circle. Navalny had been arrested under false pretenses and was even the target of an assassination attempt due to his opposition to Putin.

Like Navalny, the Americans who landed at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on Thursday night were falsely arrested by Russian police, but this time, for the specific purpose of being used as pawns and bargaining chips by Putin.

Whelan had been in Russian custody since December 2018, when he was arrested in Moscow while attending a friend’s wedding. In 2020, After nearly two years of failed negotiations by the Trump administration over Whelan’s potential release, Russia convicted Whelan on espionage charges and sentenced him to 16 years in prison.

Gershkovich appeared to be headed toward a similar fate when he was detained by Russia’s Federal Security Service in March 2023. It was the first time a journalist working for an American outlet had been arrested on espionage charges since the Cold War.

Despite failing to obtain the release of Whelan during his own presidency, Trump took advantage of Gershkovich’s unjust arrest and subsequent conviction to attack Biden. This year, Trump declared on TruthSocial that he was the only person who could successfully negotiate Gershkovich’s release.

“He will be HOME, SAFE, AND WITH HIS FAMILY. Vladimir Putin, President of Russia, will do that for me, but not for anyone else,” Trump wrote. Clearly, that proved false.

This week, Trump went to TruthSocial to spread yet another lie, trying to shame Biden for engaging in a prisoner exchange and saying that the current administration made a bad deal.

“I got back many hostages, and gave the opposing Country NOTHING,” he wrote.

But the reality is that Trump negotiated at least four prisoner exchanges, including three that involved the release of terrorists, foreign militants and biological weapons suppliers. Each of these negotiations was the result of false arrests and overt attempts to help an authoritarian nation rescue its murderers by creating the climate for a prisoner exchange.

Moreover, Trump always gave up far more than the U.S. received in exchange. In one particularly bad deal, Trump authorized the release of more than 200 murderous Houthi militants in exchange for just two American prisoners.

By comparison, this week’s deal involved the exchange of 24 prisoners, only a third of whom are Russian citizens or supportive of Putin’s regime. The other 16 are citizens of the U.S. or Germany or are anti-Putin opposition leaders supportive of Western democracy.

After announcing the prisoner swap, Biden was asked by reporters how he would respond to Trump’s claims that he could get Gershkovich released without giving up anything.

“Why didn’t he do it when he was president?” Biden said before turning to leave the room.

Touché, Mr. President.

The answer is simple: Among other attributes, Trump is a habitual liar who has repeatedly failed to deliver on almost every one of his serious campaign promises, let alone his Truth Social rants.

But beyond the baldfaced lies that make Trump untrustworthy in the eyes of friends and foes alike, Trump also lacks good relationships with the leader of every nonauthoritarian country in the world, including our strongest allies.

In this case, Germany was essential in making a deal for the release of these American hostages because it had custody of several high-value Russian assets. Unlike Trump, who was widely panned as “irresponsible” and “divisive” by Scholz and former Chancellor Angela Merkel, Biden earned Scholz’s respect and even his public endorsement last year.

On Friday, National Security Council spokesman John Kirby doubled down, noting that this is not the first time Americans detained in Russia during Trump’s administration have been freed due to Biden’s leadership.

Americans should celebrate and reward the Biden administration’s commitment to strong foreign relations, which led directly to the bittersweet but successful multinational negotiations and the release of numerous Americans, held unjustly for years by Putin and now reunited with their loved ones. However, that celebration should be tempered by the bittersweet reality that Putin created the circumstances for the exchange and will almost certainly do so again. We can do our part to help avoid these situations and keep ourselves safe by staying out of countries whose leaders seek opportunities for false arrests and prisoner swaps.

Moreover, we can help keep America, and indeed the world, safer by rejecting Trump’s failed strategies of being divisive with allies and friendly to dictators. They didn’t work when he was in the Oval Office, and there is no reason to believe they will work for the next four years.