Who Do I Call if I Want to Speak to Belgrade?

Over the past decade, I have covered three American presidential transitions and watched Congress change hands. I have seen governments assembled, political careers made and unmade, Cabinet appointments announced and occasionally abandoned, and the great machinery of American democracy preparing to hand over the keys to power.

And I can tell you this: it is not always a pretty sight.

There are rivalries, bruised egos, frantic telephone calls and ambitious people maneuvering for positions. There is, from time to time, the sort of confusion that can make a railway timetable look like a masterpiece of administrative clarity.

But beneath the commotion, there is a system. There are rules. There are people with defined responsibilities.

And when the phone rings at 3 a.m., someone knows who is supposed to answer it.

The most important job of a transition is to ensure that whoever is the incoming leader would be ready to govern on day one. Washington, for its part, has already made clear what it wants from Serbia’s transfer of power: an orderly transition.

“We support an orderly transition between the outgoing government and the new government to be formed,” a State Department spokesperson told The Pavlovic Today.

What is equally striking is what Washington has not said.

Having covered the State Department throughout the Biden administration, when I put the Western Balkans and the Kosovo negotiations on the Washington news agenda, I know that a Biden administration would by now have been considerably more public about American expectations.

The Trump administration operates rather differently.

So far, it has not attempted publicly to prescribe the political character of Serbia’s next government. Its message to me has been narrower: Washington has seen the election result, it supports an orderly transfer of power and, looking ahead, it wants to continue expanding the U.S.-Serbia relationship, including through the Strategic Dialogue.

That signals something important in itself: expected predictability and continuity.

And then, there is Marco Rubio.

Until I asked him, Secretary of State Marco Rubio had not spoken publicly about Serbia since taking office. Getting Rubio to speak about Serbia was not straightforward.

When he met then-President Aleksandar Vucic in New York in September 2025, I asked him about Serbia. He did not answer.

Then, in September 2026, I asked him directly: How did he see Serbia’s evolving role as an American strategic partner? And how, specifically, did the Trump administration intend to deepen that relationship?

For the first time as secretary of state, Rubio publicly laid out his view.

He said the United States intended to deepen its strategic partnership with Serbia, that the administration had already taken steps to bring the two countries closer and that he hoped to visit. He also acknowledged that Serbia was involved in issues that were “potentially problematic and explosive” and attracting international attention.

Serbia has since changed its parliamentary majority.

For now, the Trump administration does not have meetings with the leaders of the Student List on the books. Nor is the congressional landscape especially straightforward. Among the top lawmakers with a sustained interest in the Balkans and the standing to engage seriously on the region, Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., is in the hospital recovering from a stroke, while Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., is retiring.

That leaves Serbia’s incoming leadership with a difficult reality.

The members of the Student List, and those who may soon form Serbia’s government, do not yet have established relationships with many of the world’s leaders. Nor have they been tested in government at a moment when the international environment is exceptionally complex, volatile and crowded with competing foreign-policy priorities.

And before anyone argues that the incoming government can simply concentrate on Congress, or that Democratic control of Capitol Hill will somehow produce an entirely new American approach to the Western Balkans, it is worth remembering how Washington actually works.

American foreign policy is led by the executive branch. And the executive branch begins with the White House. There is no serious route to a relationship with the United States that simply can bypass Donald Trump over the next two years.

Whatever regional commentators may suggest, Serbia’s incoming government will have to deal with the president, his administration and the foreign-policy priorities they set.

That places an even greater responsibility on the new Serbian government to explain, clearly and quickly, what precisely it intends to become, what it wants from Washington and who has the authority to speak on Serbia’s behalf.

Now, Serbia’s parliamentary system does not require an American-style presidential transition operation. But surely there must be some minimum standard for what a peaceful transfer of power means in practice.

And that standard begins with a rather elementary question:

Who, exactly, is in charge?

What I learned covering three American transitions

When Donald Trump was first elected president in 2016, he arrived in Washington as a political outsider who had never held public office. His transition was chaotic, unpredictable and, at times, gloriously Trumpian.

But he had a transition team.

There were daily calls with the press. We could ask about his Cabinet, his appointments and his plans for governing. I was in the first press pool that traveled with Trump to Bedminster, New Jersey, as he began assembling his administration.

We did not know who would become secretary of state or who would occupy every seat around the Cabinet table. At various points, neither did the people making those decisions.

But we knew the process was underway. We knew who was communicating it. There were identifiable people whose job was to explain what was happening, answer questions and give the public some sense of the government taking shape.

The press could ask questions on behalf of the American people, and the American people could see that the transfer of power was taking place.

Then came Joe Biden.

His transition unfolded under extraordinary circumstances: the COVID-19 pandemic, severe economic disruption and a level of political polarization that would culminate in the events of January 6.

Against that backdrop, Biden’s transition team took the responsibility of preparing to govern seriously.

Jen Psaki was available, the communications operation was functioning and Biden’s team brought years of experience at the highest levels of government. There were regular briefings, policy announcements and identifiable officials responsible for explaining what the incoming administration intended to do.

One of Biden’s central commitments was also to build an administration that reflected America itself. That objective was visible in the personnel decisions being made and in the way the incoming government presented itself to the country.

Whatever one thought of its politics, there was little ambiguity about the fact that an administration was being assembled and preparing to take responsibility for governing.

Trump’s second transition was smoother than his first.

Howard Lutnick played a leading role in the process. Loyalty among appointees after Trump’s first term that had been marked by infighting was placed as the main selection variable.

The personnel operation was moving, the political messaging was constant and the direction of the incoming administration was visible well before Inauguration Day.

Three transitions. Three very different political circumstances. Three very different times in American history.

Yet all shared one indispensable feature: the people who had secured power understood that winning an election was not the same thing as preparing to exercise it.

That principle is hardly confined to the presidency. Look at Washington today.

Democrats have just won control of both chambers of Congress. The new Congress has not yet convened, but Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer is already holding news conferences taking questions and explaining the priorities. House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries is doing the same, clearly outlining what he intends to do when elected the Speaker of the House.

Newly elected senators and representatives are appearing publicly, answering questions and setting out their views. There are already disagreements about the future direction of the Democratic Party and about who should lead it.

The disagreements are visible. Journalists can ask questions. People can hear the competing arguments.

Trump, meanwhile, has seen his party suffer a devastating midterm defeat. Yet he remains president. He continues to exercise the constitutional powers of the office and to make the changes he believes are necessary for the remaining two years of his term.

Government carries on. That is the point of institutional continuity.

An election may alter the political balance. What it does not do is suspend the responsibility to govern.

And now we come to Serbia

Serbia’s Student List has won 140 seats in the 250-member parliament. It has an absolute majority, a clear electoral mandate and an extraordinary opportunity to demonstrate that a movement born in protest can become a government capable of running a country.

At present, some basic questions remain unanswered. Who is coordinating the transition? Who is authorized to speak for the incoming majority? Who is its official spokesperson? Will there be regular press briefings? Who is coordinating foreign policy, economic priorities and the preparation required to assume responsibility for the institutions of the state?

And, most importantly, who has the authority to make decisions?

The incoming majority says that forming a government is a process. Of course it is. But there is a considerable difference between saying, “We have not yet selected our ministers,” and leaving the public uncertain about who is directing the political operation in the meantime.

The first is an entirely normal feature of a parliamentary transition. The second is a question of democratic accountability.

Serbia does not need to imitate America. Its political system is different, its constitutional procedures are different and the timetable for forming a government is its own.

But the fundamental principle is universal. Winning an election gives you the mandate to govern. A transition demonstrates that you are getting ready to work on day one.

And before Serbia begins debating every minister, every foreign-policy priority and every decision the next government may make, the incoming majority should be able to answer the simplest question of all:

Who do I call if I want to speak to Belgrade?

Read Tomorrow: The Plenum Problem: Who Has the Final Word? If Serbia’s next prime minister and the student plenums disagree, whose decision prevails?

Ksenija Pavlovic McAteer is the founder and editor in chief of The Pavlovic Today, an independent newsroom credentialed at the White House, the State Department and the U.S. Senate press galleries. She has covered three American presidential transitions.