Biden aims to put final stamp on Quad partnership with hometown summit

President Joe Biden is convening the leaders of Australia, India and Japan for a Quad summit in his hometown of Wilmington, Delaware, this weekend, aiming to put a final stamp on an alliance he hopes will endure beyond his presidency.

President Joe Biden is convening the leaders of Australia, India and Japan for a Quad summit in his hometown of Wilmington, Delaware, this weekend, aiming to put a final stamp on an alliance he hopes will endure beyond his presidency. The current partnership is set to enter a new era as half of its leaders — Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida — will soon leave office. With an eye to burnishing his foreign policy legacy, the president is turning to alliances like the Quad to make a final diplomatic push to counterbalance China’s rising influence as he prepares to hand off to a new administration. The deliverables are expected to include the first-ever joint Coast Guard exercise between the Quad countries, an expansion of an initiative aimed in part at monitoring illegal fishing and collaboration to help reduce cervical cancer rates in the Indo-Pacific, senior administration officials said. “Welcome to the border of Wilmington, Delaware. I’m really pleased that you were able to be in my home, and, and see where I grew up,” Biden said during opening remarks of the summit. Biden emphasized the importance of “democracy” while also saying that the Quad is “here to stay.” “We’re democracies. Democracies, who know how to get things done,” Biden said. “While challenges will come, the world will change, because the Quad is here to stay, I believe. Here to stay.”