Welcome & Opening of the 2020 CUSLI Experts' Meeting.

• Position: Canada-U.S. Law Institute - The United States and Canada: Outlook For Bilateral Relations in 2021

Speakers: Stephen J. Petras, Jr., Dr. Christopher Sands & The Honorable Jane Harman

MR. STEPHEN J. PETRAS: Welcome, everyone, to a program put on by the Canada-United States Law Institute and the Canada Institute of the Woodrow Wilson Center. This program is on "The United States and Canada: Outlook for Bilateral Relations in 2021." We'd like to welcome all of you. The Canada-United States Law Institute is happy to collaborate again with the Canada Institute of the Woodrow Wilson Center on assessing the impact of an important election. We did this together last year, assessing the Canadian national election, and it's been a pleasure to work again with the Wilson Center.

Let me briefly tell you a little bit about the Canada-United States Law Institute. CUSLI is, first, a law institute focused on legal and policy issues facing and impacting the two countries. We have two presidents: Erika Chamberlain, dean of the Faculty of Law at the University of Western Ontario, and Michael Scharf, co-dean of Case Western Reserve University School of Law.

We also have two co-chairs: Jim Peterson, former Minister of International Trade of Canada, and Jim Blanchard, former congressman from Michigan, former governor of Michigan, and former U.S. Ambassador to Canada. We also have two national directors. Chi Carmody, professor at the Law Faculty of the University of Western Ontario, is our Canadian national director, and I am the U.S. national director from Case Western Reserve University School of Law.

CUSLI focuses on policy and legal issues facing the two countries. We do this through our Experts' Meeting, our Annual Conference, and our scholarly articles published in the Canada-United States Law Journal. This coming year, in 2021, we will have our Annual Conference on April 22 and 23--hopefully in person, but at least virtually--that will focus on the Arctic. And it'll focus on the impact of climate change on regional security issues in the Arctic, on Indigenous peoples in the Arctic, on the environment of the Arctic, and on international relations in the Arctic. So, please mark your calendar for that important event.

Today, we are here to assess the results of the election of Joseph Biden as the forty-sixth president of the United States. To lead this event is Christopher Sands, professor of the John Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies and the director of the Canada Institute of the Woodrow Wilson Center. Chris holds many distinguished...