The outcome of next month’s presidential election in the United States could significantly influence Manila’s defense alliance with Washington and its territorial claims in the South China Sea, observers said.
With Kamala Harris and Donald Trump jostling to become the next occupant of the Oval Office, some analysts interviewed by BenarNews shared their perspectives on how a new administration in Washington might shape U.S.-Philippines relations and Manila’s territorial claim in the hotly disputed waterway.
A Harris administration would likely continue America’s robust support for the Philippines under a 73-year-old defense pact, analysts said, while a second Trump presidency could introduce uncertainty and what some observers described as a more “transactional” approach to bilateral relations.
On the 2024 campaign trail, neither of the candidates have articulated or talked directly about what their policy toward the South China Sea would be, if elected president, and have largely focused their speeches at rallies on the economy and other domestic issues. But in the past, both contenders have addressed the hot-button geopolitical issue of the South China Sea during official visits to the Philippines.
The outlook under a Harris presidency
If Harris, the current U.S. vice president and Democratic Party nominee for the presidency, wins in November, expect to see her carry on with the Biden administration’s policies on the Philippines and South China Sea, some analysts told BenarNews.
“A Kamala Harris administration can be expected to give full support to the Philippines under the Mutual Defense Treaty and pursue continuity in the Biden administration’s national security and national defense strategies,” said Carlyle Thayer, emeritus professor of politics at the University of New South Wales Canberra.
Signed in 1951, the treaty calls on both Manila and Washington to aid each other militarily in case either country is attacked by an external power. U.S. military leaders have said they are prepared to assist the Philippines if it invoked the treaty amid threats from other nations.
Amid tensions between rival claimants Beijing and Manila over the South China Sea, the Biden administration has indicated that it would help the Philippines defend itself in the event of an armed attack “anywhere in the South China Sea.”
“A Harris administration would likely approve, subject to concurrence by the Philippines, the deployment of equipment, weapons and personnel to support the Philippines in a crisis involving China at Second Thomas Shoal and/or Sabina Shoal," Thayer told BenarNews via email.
Tense standoffs between the rival territorial claimants have occurred lately in disputed waters even after both sides agreed in July to dial down tensions in the South China Sea.
“If Kamala Harris comes to power, there will be a continuity of Biden’s foreign policy and she herself has advocated closer ties with Manila and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations,” said Kumari Mansi, deputy director at the Indo-Pacific Studies Center, a policy think-tank.
“She has been the highest-ranking American official to visit the [Philippine] province of Palawan, a province facing the [South China Sea] amid tensions between Manila and Beijing," Mansi told BenarNews on Tuesday.
During a November 2022 visit to Palawan, an island on the frontline of the Philippines' maritime dispute with China, Harris hit out at Beijing over its coercive tactics in the South China Sea and reiterated Washington’s full military support for Manila. Her office also announced millions of dollars in aid for Philippine maritime law enforcement agencies.
“The United States and the broader international community have a profound stake in the future of this region. America’s prosperity relies on the billions of dollars [of commerce] that flow through these waters every day, and we are proud to work with you in your mission,” the U.S. vice president said then during a speech in Palawan aboard a Philippine Coast Guard ship.
“As an ally, the United States stands with the Philippines in the face of intimidation and coercion in the South China Sea.”
On that trip to the Philippines, Harris also visited President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. The two have met six times in their government roles and have formed a strong bond, said Mansi, an assistant professor at Amity University in India.
“This will certainly be reflected in American foreign policy toward the Philippines under Harris,” he said.
Harris became the uncontested presidential candidate on the Democratic ticket after President Joe Biden bowed out from the electoral race in July over concerns about his health and whether he could defeat Trump a second time at the polls.
The outlook under another Trump presidency
Trump, the Republican Party nominee for president, who was previously elected to the White House in 2016, traveled to Manila as U.S. commander-in-chief in November 2017. During that visit, he reaffirmed Washington’s defense alliance with Manila and support for a free and open Asia-Pacific.
Trump also hailed his “great relationship” with then-Philippine leader Rodrigo Duterte.
Then-Philippine presidential spokesman Harry Roque later described President Trump’s meeting with Duterte as “very warm and very friendly.”
Should Trump return to the White House for another term, he will likely maintain strong ties between the U.S. and the Philippines, said Ambassador Jose Manuel Romualdez, Manila’s envoy to Washington since 2017 – the year Trump took office.
“I don’t see any risk at all. We’ve had ups and downs with the U.S., but it has always endured,” Romualdez told Bloomberg News in July, adding he expected that a Trump administration would continue with the current U.S. strategy of countering China’s activities in the South China Sea.
Still, some analysts predicted that a second Trump presidency could bring uncertainty to the alliance between the two nations and Manila’s claim in the South China Sea.
“What is worrisome is that Trump, during his first administration, seemed to be uninterested in the U.S.-Philippines alliance,” wrote Derek Grossman, a senior defense analyst at RAND Corp., a policy think-tank headquartered in California.
“Perhaps the biggest loser in Southeast Asia from a second Trump administration would be the Philippines … [which] has expanded and deepened its security alliance with Washington to help counter Beijing’s rising gray-zone tactics in the South China Sea.”
“Without U.S. support, the Philippines would be mostly left to fend for itself against the growing Chinese encroachments into its exclusive economic zone,” Grossman added.
Other analysts shared similar views.
“A Trump administration would be entirely unpredictable,” Thayer said. “He has disdain for tiny rocks and islets and no appreciation of maritime strategy.
“[I]f tensions between China and the Philippines rise, increasing the threat of armed conflict, Trump is likely to personally intervene and conduct summit diplomacy with President Xi Jinping to seek a transactional solution,” he said. “Trump will be inclined to seek a quid pro quo with China over the head of the Philippines.”
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A ‘cornerstone’ alliance in Southeast Asia
Meanwhile, one analyst agreed that a new administration under Trump could cast doubt on the U.S. commitment – or it could play out the opposite way, bringing greater defense cooperation between Washington and Manila.
“A Trump administration might adopt a transactional approach, which could revisit past criticisms of allies ‘free-riding,’ casting doubt on the U.S. commitment under the MDT and straining relations,” said Lynn Kuok, the Lee Kuan Yew chair for Southeast Asia Studies at the Brookings Institution, using an acronym for the 1951 defense treaty.
“But a hawkish Republican administration could also double down on defending the Philippines,” she wrote.
Regardless of the outcome of the American presidential election on Nov. 5, the defense alliance between Manila and Washington will have implications for regional security and dynamics, Kuok said.
The alliance of the two nations is a “cornerstone of U.S. alliances and partnerships in Southeast Asia, a sub-region at the heart of the Indo-Pacific, America’s ‘priority theater,’” Kuok wrote.
![A map shows occupied or administered islands in the disputed South China Sea. [AFP]](https://www.rfa.org/resizer/v2/OQPZHHLF57RVOCJIX3XFWH2B7E.png?auth=43d763a694349ffde7964402e50c016b3ddd0da60019d250196c61a846041923&width=800&height=664)
Another analyst said that establishing an approach toward Manila should occur early in the next president’s term.
“Getting U.S. policy toward the Philippines right in the first 100 days will have singular importance in [Southeast Asia], as it did early in the Biden administration,” wrote Gregory Poling, a senior fellow and director of the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington-based think-tank.
“Whether Harris or Trump occupies the White House in January 2025, the Philippines will expect the United States to reiterate its commitment to defend Filipino lives and rights in the South China Sea,” Poling said.
BenarNews is an RFA-affiliated online news organization.