A prominent Democrat, Emanuel has devoted his life to public service, holding influential leadership positions as U.S. ambassador to Japan under the Biden administration, chief of staff to President Obama, senior advisor to President Clinton, mayor of Chicago, and member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Illinois. 

Known for straight talk and relentless drive, he joined a fireside chat with Ambassador Michael McFaul, a senior fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI), the Ken Olivier and Angela Nomellini Professor of International Studies in the Department of Political Science, and the Peter and Helen Bing Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution.

Emanuel, for whom politics and diplomacy are fundamentally about trust and measurable results, criticized both the Democratic and Republican Parties for failing the American people. As he explores the possibility of a 2028 presidential run, he views the 2026 midterm elections as a referendum on President Trump, urging Democrats to be “disciplined on both operations and message” and keep the focus on the point that “this is a rubber-stamp Republican Congress for Donald Trump.”

The event included opening remarks from APARC and Japan Program Director Kiyoteru Tsutsui, a senior fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI), professor of sociology, the Henri H. and Tomoye Takahashi Professor and Senior Fellow in Japanese Studies at APARC. Following his dialogue with McFaul, Emanuel engaged with the audience in a lively question-and-answer session.

Before the public event, Emanuel joined Tsutsui on the APARC Briefing podcast to offer his take on topics ranging from America's current political hinge moment and how to explain it to Asian stakeholders, the Democratic Party's leadership challenges, the U.S. ambassador's influence on Japanese politics, lessons from his experience in Japan that might improve American governance, and what’s ahead for Japan as it approaches a national election on February 8, 2026.

Indo-Pacific Strategy and Japan’s Role

Appointed as the 31st U.S. Ambassador to Japan by President Biden, Emanuel served in Tokyo from 2022 to January 2025, a period in which the United States prioritized bolstering ties with allies and partners in the Indo-Pacific to counter an alignment of competitors and adversaries, including China, Russia, North Korea, and Iran.

He outlined what he described as a core to the Biden administration's Indo-Pacific strategy: flipping China's coercive playbook. Where Beijing punishes countries for decisions grounded in their national security interests — for instance, imposing economic embargoes on South Korea over missile defense systems or Australia over COVID-19 inquiries — the U.S. strategy focused on building coalitions that isolated China diplomatically.

That Indo-Pacific strategy included export controls on advanced semiconductors to China, coordinated with Japan and the Netherlands, and the revitalization of the Quad partnership with India, Australia, and Japan. Furthermore, the Camp David trilateral summit, which created a security pact between the United States, Japan, and South Korea, represented what Emanuel called “China's worst day in the world."

"China's strategy is, you get out of line politically, military, economically — slam. Your sovereignty and independence are over,” Emanuel said. "Our strategy: We're going to isolate the isolator."

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Emanuel emphasized that Japan represents "the long pole" of America's presence in the Indo-Pacific — a cornerstone ally not only for its strategic, economic, and military importance but also for its exceptional soft power throughout the region. "If you look at every survey across the ASEAN countries, the number one most respected country and people: Japan, by heads or tails.”

This influence proved crucial in moments requiring regional coordination, as Japan brought not just resources but also credibility and relationships that amplified American interests: “a one-two punch with the United States.”

He provided examples of successful outcomes of this approach. When organizing the March 2022 UN resolution (ES-11/1) condemning Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Japan mobilized ASEAN countries, securing support from eight of the eleven nations, with four co-sponsoring the resolution, including Cambodia, a country with minimal U.S. dialogue. "The United States never thought of doing that, couldn't organize it, couldn't get them on the call," Emanuel recalled. "Japan goes and does it."

“The Indo-Pacific is an ‘away game’ for the United States,” he stressed. “If you want to not have a kinetic moment, you’d better have credibility around your deterrence. And Japan brings all of that.”

Warning: Strategic Gains Squandered

Emanuel delivered a searing critique of recent foreign policy shifts under the Trump administration. The Japan-Korea-U.S. trilateral alignment, painstakingly built, now languishes. "The Korean president [Lee Jae Myung] comes to Japan — one is a progressive, the other [Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi] of the conservative LDP. And the United States? Not even the phone's on hold. Nowhere to be found," Emanuel said of current U.S. engagement.

The Quad partnership faces similar neglect, and the U.S. relationship with India is frozen. "We spent every administration, regardless of party, 35 years bringing India into the fold," Emanuel said. This bipartisan effort to bring India into America's orbit risks being "thrown away" by the Trump administration, he argued.

Emanuel characterized the Trump administration’s approach as mercantilist rather than strategic, focused on transactional deals rather than long-term positioning. He predicted claims of securing "the biggest, best trade deal ever" with China that would ultimately prove hollow, leaving allies more insecure and America's strategic position diminished.

Domestic Choices and a Crisis in America

Pivoting to domestic challenges, Emanuel argued forcefully that America's greatest threats are self-inflicted. Criticizing both the Democratic and Republican Parties for leaving voters without access to the American Dream, he described a fundamental shift in economic priorities from wealth creation to wealth preservation, as the elite benefit while everyone else is left behind.

“And now you have a rupture, to use Prime Minister Carney's term, between the American society and the American kind of elite and establishment. And that explains, I think, not just this moment, but why this moment's political dynamic seems so unsettling,” Emanuel said.

"We have a 30-year low on reading and math scores. China didn't do that," he said. "We declare war on the greatest research universities the world has ever seen — not China. We decide whether we change it or we're okay with it."

When America focuses its innovation and entrepreneurial engine, it is unmatched, Emanuel insisted. But facing a competitor 3.5 times America's population size, "we don't have a person to waste or a community to overlook."

When asked by Tsutsui how to explain to Asian stakeholders what is happening in American politics and society under the second Trump administration, Emmanuel replied: 

“Every president, regardless of party, has tried to govern. Donald Trump tries to rule [...] He doesn't care about Congress. It is the most unproductive Congress in over three decades [...] They are not interested in showing up for their job. And so he is acting unconstrained by either the Supreme Court or the other co-called branch of government, the legislative branch.

Seafood and Trains: Politics as Trust-Building

Reflecting on his ambassadorial experience, Emanuel recounted some of the ways he built rapport and trust with the Japanese government and people. He defied State Department protocols to ride Japan’s public transportation system, particularly the Shinkansen, generating enormous positive attention and goodwill. “It was a different way of saying that America was a more accessible partner,” he remarked.

In summer 2023, when China banned Japanese seafood imports following the release of treated radioactive wastewater from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, Emanuel marshaled U.S. Armed Forces contracts for Japanese scallops, traveled to Fukushima to publicly consume local seafood, and used surveillance imagery to document Chinese vessels fishing in Japanese waters and selling banned Japanese fish — all to demonstrate American solidarity.

"I wanted to show our allies there was political support and willingness to stand firm," he explained. "America wasn't asking you to do something if we weren't going to do it ourselves."

Emanuel emphasized that "politics is about trust" and that building credible, sustained relationships with both domestic constituencies and international partners remains the foundation of effective governance and America’s strategic best interest. 

When it comes to building and sustaining alliances and partnerships in the Indo-Pacific, he said, “You have to do that with the mindset that what you're doing is not just building up trust. You're building up in service of deterrence of China's actions in the region.”