From a large opposition party to a strong White House... The double whammy of Korean government and companies in ‘coordinate setting’

(Washington = Yonhap News) Correspondent Park Seong-min = With the U.S. midterm elections, the topography of the U.S. political world has changed significantly, leading to greater uncertainty in future U.S. policies for the Korean government and companies.

As the opposition Democratic Party won a landslide victory in the midterm elections held on the 3rd and took control of the Federal Congress by a large margin, U.S. President Donald Trump suddenly replaced the White House chief of staff on the 6th.

As the parliamentary environment changed completely in the second half of his second term in office, he began to prepare for the remaining two years of his term by replacing the chief of staff, who overall assisted in the realization of his national affairs tasks and led the implementation of domestic and foreign policies.

In response to this, there are predictions that the U.S. political world will continue to experience a stalemate over the next two years in which conflicts and confrontations, rather than dialogue and cooperation, will deepen between the administration and Congress amidst the ruling party vs. opposition party.

This is because Stephen Miller, White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy, who was selected as the successor Chief of Staff, is President Trump's closest confidant and a strong believer in the 'America First' policy stance.

New Chief of Staff Miller, the 'architect' of the Trump administration's hard-line immigration policy, is a person with an imperialist ideology that puts America's interests first while putting maximum pressure on allies in foreign policy.

Amid the perception that the United States has regressed due to being exploited by its allies for decades, he is known to passionately support measures to extort high tariffs from allies or to encourage investment in the United States instead.

A political environment has been created in which extreme head-on collisions are likely to continue between the White House, which seeks to maintain or further strengthen existing hard-line policies in various domestic and foreign policies, and the Congress, which seeks to thoroughly investigate and check the executive branch while changing the direction of existing policies through new legislation.

America's allies are faced with a Congress controlled by the Democratic Party, which traditionally values ​​cooperation with allies and is critical of the Trump administration's transaction-oriented diplomacy, and a White House that can use any means against allies for the benefit of the United States.

The Korean government is also burdened with the additional diplomatic burden of having to set appropriate coordinates while simultaneously dealing with two sides with extremely different political tendencies and ideologies in order to pursue our country's core interests.

Looking at the security field on the Korean Peninsula, there is a possibility that the Democratic Congress will put the brakes on any security policy changes, such as a reduction in U.S. troops stationed in Korea or an excessive increase in defense cost sharing, but it is impossible to predict what kind of pressure the White House will use to bypass legislation by using the president's executive authority.

Tariffs and pressure on investments in the U.S. could also be strengthened by checks from the Democratic Congress, but close diplomatic coordination with the White House is expected to be essential.

During the second Trump administration, all trade policies, including tariffs, have been implemented through the signing of executive orders or proclamations using existing laws, and the president's executive authority can be fully utilized in foreign policy and trade sanctions in the future.

In addition, while there are many predictions that the Democratic Party is likely to oppose the issues of Korea's introduction of nuclear-powered submarines, expansion of powers to enrich and reprocess spent nuclear fuel, and transfer of wartime operational control, it is necessary to persuade the White House to push ahead despite opposition in Congress.

Korean companies also faced uncertainty due to rapid changes in the U.S. political environment after the midterm elections.

The semiconductor industry, Korea's representative export item, has no choice but to closely watch the market impact following the Democratic Party's landslide victory, including a plunge in the New York stock market, and is known to be paying close attention to whether subsidies for the construction of semiconductor production facilities in the United States will proceed without a hitch.

In order to consistently generate profits in the huge U.S. market, companies are also burdened with having to engage in conflicting lobbying against the U.S. government and Congress, which have polarized policy directions and lines.

The emergence of new Chief Secretary Miller, who has been pushing hard immigration and tariff policies, does not seem to be good news for companies.

If the Trump administration implements additional hard-line tariff policies, such as invoking Article 232 of the Trade Expansion Act, which imposes punitive tariffs on certain items against foreign countries, companies exporting such products may lose their competitiveness with other foreign companies in the U.S. market.

The fact that Chief of Staff Miller is prioritizing the deportation of illegally residing foreign workers amidst the mass detention of Korean workers in Georgia last year means that related risks to companies have not been completely resolved.

Unlike her predecessor, Suzy Wiles, who is known to have actively served as a channel of communication with the business community, it is unclear to what extent the new Chief of Staff Miller is friendly to the business community or foreign companies.