The Biden White House will redesignate the Yemeni Houthis as a terrorist group on Wednesday in response to nearly three months of firing missiles at and hijacking commercial shipping in international waters. The decision will be made public on Wednesday. The Biden White House will not return the Houthis to the US list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTO) where President Trump placed them on January 11, 2021...you read that right: Trump declared them terrorists ten days before leaving office. Instead, the Houthi movement and its members will be declared Specially Designated Global Terrorists (SDGT).

This change in status for the Houthis was expected, as Biden himself had said they were terrorists.

READ: NEW: Biden Seems to Contradict Himself on Houthis in Bizarre Statement That Has People Talking

The difference between the two designations is more than semantic. 

Doing business with an FTO subjects you to sanctions, or if you are an American, to a lengthy prison term for material support of terrorism. Collaborating with an SDGT means nothing.

After dozens of Houthi terror attacks, the Biden admin will re-sanction the group - but won't put them on the FTO list.

Which means:
1. Houthis can still get US visas;
2. Not a criminal penalty to support them;
3. US banks don't have to seize their funds.https://t.co/pVvSDoxNZh

— Gabriel Noronha (@GLNoronha) January 16, 2024

This is just another example of the half-measures and gross dishonesty that characterizes just about every facet of Joe Biden's presidency, whether it be relations with Iran or China or the craven lack of support provided to Ukraine.

The Iran-backed Houthi group has launched dozens of attacks since November on vessels in the Red Sea, a vital corridor for the world’s shipping traffic, in what they say is an effort to support Palestinians in the war with Israel. U.S. and British forces have responded by carrying out dozens of air and sea strikes on Houthi targets in Yemen since Friday. The attacks by the Houthis have continued.

Linda Thomas Greenfield, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said last week that 2,000 ships since November have been forced to divert thousands of miles to avoid the Red Sea. Houthi militants have threatened or taken hostage mariners from more than 20 countries.

The Biden administration resisted striking back for weeks before U.S. and U.K. warships and aircraft launched waves of missiles at the Houthis in Yemen early Friday.

The restraint reflected larger U.S. concerns about upending a shaky truce in a separate years-long war in Yemen and triggering a wider conflict in the region.

Thanks to the strategic ineptitude in this White House, if the civil war in Yemen spreads, it will only be because we've empowered the Houthis with our timidity. Besides that, I'm not really sure there is a lot of difference in how the Horn of Africa region looks, whether it is at war or in peace. What is a fact is that over ten percent of the world's commerce used to pass through the Red Sea. That is no longer the case. The Pole Star of Pax America has been the principle of freedom of navigation in international waters. If that principle isn't enforced, then world commerce falls apart.

The argument for keeping the Houthis off the FTO list is that all the aid organizations giving food and medicine to Houthi terrorists would be subject to sanctions. That strikes me as a profoundly disingenuous reason. All it took was an Executive Order to establish the FTO and SDGT lists. It seems to me that if you are really concerned about Yemen and not just worried about making Iran angry, all it takes is a brief Executive Order creating a carve-out for providing aid to Yemen.

All tomorrow will bring is a shameless public relations exercise to attempt to paper over a feckless and dangerous foreign policy.