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The pope’s U.S. visit in 2015 was a powerful moment for Biden.
President Biden has met two previous popes: John Paul II and Benedict XVI. And he famously told Benedict to be easier on American nuns, the target of a Vatican crackdown for their activism on issues like poverty and health care.
But his fondness for Pope Francis is obvious.
When Francis visited the United States in September 2015, Mr. Biden along with President Barack Obama and their families met him at the airport. He and his wife, Jill Biden, were in the front row when Francis spoke at the White House. Mr. Biden sat behind the pope when he delivered his speech to Congress, and accompanied him through much of his six-day sojourn in the United States. Mr. Biden and his entire family then saw Francis off at Philadelphia International Airport.It was a powerful meeting for Mr. Biden, still grieving over the loss of his son, Beau Biden, to cancer some five months before.
On a visit to Vatican City for the Third International Regenerative Medicine Conference in April 2016, Mr. Biden spoke about the urgent need to come up with new cures for cancer. (The conference was intended to highlight the extraordinary research advances being made with adult stem cells while largely sidestepping the issue of research using fetal tissue or embryonic stem cells.)
AdvertisementHe also thanked Francis for that meeting in Philadelphia.
“He asked if he would meet with my family — we had just lost my son,” Mr. Biden said. “And he met with my extended family in the hangar behind where the aircraft was. And I wish every grieving parent, brother, sister, mother, father, would have the benefit of his words, his prayers, his presence. He provided us with more comfort that even he, I think, will understand.”
Francis then addressed the conference, encouraging participants to seek cures for cancers that affect few people and whose treatments might not be profitable, and to fight for access to treatment for all.
‘America Is Respected Again!’ Trump Tweets as Allies Question His Leadership’
WASHINGTON — President Trump retooled a campaign slogan on Monday to defend his worldview, declaring that “AMERICA IS RESPECTED AGAIN!” during a four-hour Twitter tirade as foreign allies braced for the potentially destabilizing effects of his policy decisions on national security.
Democratic leaders accused the president of “plunging the country into chaos” on Christmas Eve.
Ensconced in the White House with no official plans other than hosting a meeting on border security and tracking Santa Claus on military radar, Mr. Trump showed no sign of slowing a Twitter storm amid a government shutdown, the fallout over his defense secretary’s resignation and a cratering stock market.
In the midst of posting, he even lamented, “I am all alone (poor me).”
His posts were replete with grievances about funds for border security, the Federal Reserve chairman, Democrats critical of his relationship with American allies and Brett McGurk, the departing special envoy for the global coalition fighting the Islamic State.
“To those few Senators who think I don’t like or appreciate being allied with other countries, they are wrong, I DO,” Mr. Trump wrote in a pair of tweets critical of Jim Mattis, his departing defense secretary. “What I don’t like, however, is when many of these same countries take advantage of their friendship with the United States, both in Military Protection and Trade.”
Mr. Trump added: “General Mattis did not see this as a problem. I DO, and it is being fixed!”
Mr. Mattis’s resignation letter on Thursday served as a rebuke of the president’s sharp demands of America’s allies and softened approach toward some of its adversaries. Only over the weekend did Mr. Trump realize that Mr. Mattis’s letter was a critique of the president’s policies, leading him to accelerate Mr. Mattis’s departure.
The resignation was prompted by Mr. Trump’s abrupt decisions last week to pull troops from Syria and Afghanistan. Those moves have plunged some of the United States’ longest allied partners into uncertainty as they grapple with an American leader who largely treats those relationships as bottom-line business transactions.
‘U.S., Supporting Mexico’s Plan, Will Invest $5.8 Billion in Central America’
WASHINGTON — The United States, joining an effort by Mexico, will commit to investing billions in Central America in hopes of ending the poverty, violence and drug-trafficking that are driving thousands of people in the region to undertake the difficult trek to the United States, the State Department announced on Tuesday.
Mexico’s new president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, introduced what he called a “Marshall Plan” last week to address the root causes of Central American migration: a $30 billion initiative to invest in the region and welcome migrants into Mexico with visas, health care and employment.
On Tuesday, the Trump administration signaled its support for the plan, saying it was committing $5.8 billion in private and public investments in Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador. Much of that amount, however, was previously committed or contingent on the identification of “commercially viable projects.”
The promise comes amid tensions between the administration and Mexico over a caravan of migrants traveling from Central America, with President Trump pushing Mexico to allow those seeking asylum in the United States to remain in Mexico while they wait.
The United States “welcomes the historic commitment by the government of Mexico to development in southern Mexico and to promote our shared goals with the countries of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras,” the State Department said in a statement. “Furthermore, the United States also wishes to recognize Mexico’s willingness to develop a framework to ensure migration occurs in a legal, orderly and safe manner.”