Pressure Rises on Biden To Remake Ties with Saudi Over Khashoggi Killing, Yemen War

By Staff, ABC News

During the 2020 campaign, then-US President Joe Biden had harsh words for Saudi Arabia, one of his country’s key partners in the Middle East who his predecessor Donald Trump warmly embraced.

"I would make it very clear we were not going to, in fact, sell more weapons to them. We were going to, in fact, make them pay the price and make them, in fact, the pariah that they are," Biden said in 2019, calling for accountability for the murder of Washington Post columnist and Saudi dissident Jamal Khashoggi.

A group of Democratic lawmakers hope to put pressure on the Biden administration to do just that. At the same time, a human rights group is targeting Saudi Arabia and those with close ties to the kingdom, including investment banks like Goldman Sachs, military contractors like Lockheed Martin, and regional allies like the United Arab Emirates.

In their letter to Biden's Secretary of State Antony Blinken, 10 top Democratic lawmakers urged the administration to undertake a wider reevaluation of the US-Saudi relationship, including by releasing an unclassified version of the US intelligence community's assessment of the Khashoggi murder -- something Biden's Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines promised to do during her Senate confirmation hearing.

"President Biden will undoubtedly face pressure from Saudi Arabia and its Gulf allies to forget this pledge. We hope you will nonetheless make it clear that the burden for maintaining a positive relationship cannot fall entirely on the United States. The Saudi government must show greater respect for American concerns about the treatment of our citizens and residents, the humanitarian catastrophe in Yemen, and fundamental human rights," wrote Reps. Gregory Meeks, D-N.Y., chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee; Adam Smith, D-Wash., chair of the Armed Services Committee; Adam Schiff, D-Calif., chair of the intelligence committee; James McGovern, D-Mass.; Tom Malinowski, D-N.J.; Ted Deutch, D-Fla.; Dean Phillips, D-Minn.; Gerald Connolly, D-Va.; Ted Lieu, D-Calif.; and Colin Allred, D-Texas.

Their letter also called on Biden to immediately reverse the foreign terrorist organization designation on the Ansarullah revolutionaries in Yemen who are fighting a Saudi-led coalition backing the Yemeni government and freeze the "delivery of offensive weapons" to the Saudis for that war.

In the face of four years of pressure, including from Republican lawmakers, Trump stood by Saudi Arabia and the UAE, using his veto to protect US arms sales and maintain support for their coalition in Yemen.

While Blinken has already made some moves that put the Saudis on notice, he noted Wednesday the kingdom is a "partner" -- avoiding Biden's word choice of "pariah." Even if the administration rescinds some arms sales, pushes for a negotiated settlement to the war in Yemen or speaks up on human rights in Saudi Arabia, it seems unlikely that partnership will largely change.