Donald Trump won the presidential election on Nov 5th, to become the 47th President of the US to the adulation of some and to the shock and horror of many others. Leaders around the world, from allies to enemies and many within American institutions will now be recalibrating their positions for another term of the unpredictable president. Trump is a vociferous liar, who has a very flexible relationship with facts where he is always right and everyone else is wrong. So, what can we expect from a second Trump term?
The first Trump presidency left a lot to be desired. Donald Trump, at the time, made more than 280 campaign promises. President Trump delivered on tax cuts, left the Paris climate accord and reformed the judiciary. He also delivered on moving the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, increasing military spending and cutting regulation. This is where his achievements ended with the common factor being delivering on business related promises. Trump made little progress on building the Mexican wall, repealing Obamacare, reducing the national debt, deporting illegal immigrants and rebuilding infrastructure which the US so desperately needed. President Trump completely abandoned exiting NATO, approved waterboarding and prosecuting Hilary Clinton. Trump’s final tally was he managed to deliver on only 35% of his promises, he broke 43% of them, compromised on 12% of them, and the remaining 10% of promises were so vague they couldn’t be measured.
The Impossible President
When Trump announced that he would again run for president back in 2022, he caused strong concern among the factions of the US establishment that collaborated against him. The Republican party stood against Trump when he first stood back in 2015, but he defeated seasoned Republican politicians one after the other. But after he won the primaries and then the presidency they were forced to support him.
With all the court cases against Trump and after the events of Capital Hill in January 2021 where he refused to accept the electoral result, senior Republicans believed Trump shouldn’t be allowed to stand as their official candidate again. Liz Chaney, daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney even campaigned against Trump, but she was forced to accept that Trump’s popularity among the electorate remains so high that Republican politicians fear to speak out publicly against Trump, even if they disagree with him. Instead, they try to ally with him in order to personally benefit from his popularity.[1]
Trump’s popularity is what allowed him to increase his influence in the official institutions of the Republican Party. He pressured the chairperson of the Republican National Convention (RNC), Ronna McDaniel, to resign. Trump then publicly supported Michael Whatley to take her place. At the same time, Trump’s daughter-in-law Lara Trump joined the RNC election for the co-chair position. Their first act was the appointment of the manager of Trump’s 2024 election campaign, Chris LaCivita, as the RNC’s chief operating officer. This ensured that anything the RNC did, supported Trump’s attempt to be re-elected as president.[2]
Donald Trump’s takeover of the Republican Party was further consolidated when a number of Republican megadonors saw a second Trump presidency as an opportunity to get their preferred policies implemented.[3] This saw significant support for Trump from many think tanks, in particular The Heritage Foundation.
Trump is a vociferous liar, who has a very flexible relationship with facts where he is always right and everyone else is wrong
The 47th US President
What can we expect from Trump’s second term? From Trump’s first term, despite the high turnover of staff, his personnel choices will shape his administration, and different factions have been jockeying for influence. Some have radical ideas about transforming the administrative state and American foreign policy, others with more conventional views. It looks like the more extreme factions will have the upper hand, and they will press their advantage to contain more moderate voices, hollow out the ranks of civilian and military professionals they see as “the deep state,” and perhaps use the levers of government to go after Trump’s opponents and critics.
Trump’s campaign for the presidency offers little insight into what his approach will be as it lacked detail, coherence and much of it was not even true. What we do know about Trump’s worldview is its based upon zero sum transnationalism. America first is translated into raw nationalism and militarism, alongside authoritarianism and Trump, himself and the US having honour, status and respect. These have been the only constants in Trump’s political career.
Trump had long outsourced his transition to the Heritage Foundation’s infamous Project 2025 and the less well-known transition project of the America First Institute. The work done by MAGA true believers on those projects is indicative of what a Trump administration will do.
The Heritage Foundation has led the effort in developing the Presidential Transition Project. Their key policy proposals were documented in a publication from April 2023, entitled “Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise”. Which also included a “180-day playbook” to manage the transition period after Trump wins the 2024 presidential elections.
At the core of the policy proposals is “the unitary view of executive power”. It proposes that the US president is given more power, at the expense of government institutions. In this way, the US president would be enabled to determine public policy. The role of the government institutions would then be limited to executing these policies which are presidentially decreed, and they would no longer be an active member in the deliberations that lead to the formulation of the policies as is presently the case.
In the “180-day playbook”, it proposed Trump fires thousands of civil servants upon his appointment as president and replaces them with “conservatives” who support the policy proposals set out by Project 2025. After this “shock therapy”, Project 2025 proposes that an even larger number of positions inside the US government institutions are to become political appointments, meaning that the president and his staff determine who holds the position. This is to ensure the government institutions remain unquestioning executors of presidential policy decisions. These proposals are to avoid a repeat of Trump’s experiences during his first tenure as president, when government institutions conspired to prevent him from having a real impact on policy and decision-making.
International Domain
As to the policy recommendations of the “Mandate for Leadership,” it proposes that the US end its support for the global climate change agenda and refocus its energy policy back on domestically produced fossil fuels. As a consequence it proposes that the US (again) withdraws from the Paris Climate Accord, ends all types of government support for green energy solutions, including electric cars and instead supports coal, oil and gas companies to increase fossil fuel production inside the country.
In the international arena the Mandate proposes that the US works to restore its position of hegemonic power in the world via a focus on military strength. It identifies China as “…the United States’ most important enemy…”, and the Department of Defense is to be given significantly more resources to dominate it. These additional resources should be invested in additional soldiers, and in the development of new nuclear weapons and other forms of nuclear technology. This aggressive, militaristic approach to international relations is to be supported by the United States diplomatic corps. The Mandate proposes that it adopts a more aggressive stance towards both American allies and enemies. Allies are to be put under pressure to become stronger and more active supporters of the policies of the United States, while enemies are to be threatened with regime change to make them fall in line.
The United States’ support for international institutions such as the World Bank (WB), International Monetary Fund (IMF), and even the United Nations (UN), the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is to be scaled back or even ended if these institutions do not unquestioningly side with the United States.
As far as international policy is concerned, the policy proposals of the Heritage Foundation are eerily similar to the proposals of the “Project for A New American Century (PNAC)
In an interview with the New York Times the president of the Heritage Foundation explained that it is also against the European Union, and more generally against the “European Project” that is targeting far-reaching collaboration between the European nations. Instead of the US collaboration with regional coordinating or collaborating bodies such as the EU and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the Heritage Foundation proposes one-on-one, bilateral collaborations between the US and other nations.[4]
In the economic realm, all relations with China are to be ended. Domestically, taxes are to be lowered and markets are to be deregulated further. The Mandate also proposed to end the Federal Reserve and establish a system of “free banking”.
As far as social policy is concerned, the Mandate proposes a “Christian values” based approach, focusing on support for “the traditional family” and ending government policies that target “diversity” and “LBGTQ” promotion.[5]
Donald Trump won a second term as his team correctly identified the economy and immigration as the key issues Americans are unhappy about. The Biden administration tried to address the frustration over these issues, but they had little to no real impact. Biden’s “Build Back Better” policy framework was presented as designed to rebuild America’s middle class, but only a small minority of American middle-class families actually believe this has been achieved. Many believe “Bidenomics” did not help America’s middle class and during the Biden administration, inflation in the US has been significantly higher than usual, which has made the essentials of life – food, energy – significantly more expensive.[6]
The policies proposed by the Heritage Foundation do not address the economic frustrations of America’s middle class. Fundamentally, the economic policy vision proposed by the Heritage Foundation is a continuation of the neoliberal agenda that caused the worsening of income inequality in the US (and globally) since the 1970s that underpins these frustrations. The current US’ billionaire class support for a second Trump presidency is exactly because they believe they can again “manage” him to implement lower taxes and market deregulations that “support business”.[7]
As far as international policy is concerned, the policy proposals of the Heritage Foundation are eerily similar to the proposals of the “Project for A New American Century (PNAC)” that guided the presidency of George W. Bush (2001 – 2009). PNAC also proposed a “military first” vision for the US, based on the belief that the US could best secure its interests by dominating the rest of the world militarily. The results of this policy are well known. The US ended up entering wars in Afghanistan and Iraq that almost bankrupted it, while the neglect of diplomacy in its War on Terror caused it to lose significantly in the area of “soft power.”
All this indicates that a new Trump presidency is most likely to further worsen the polarisation of American society, weaken the US influence internationally, and lead to heightened geopolitical instability. Polarisation will worsen because Trump himself antagonises a large section of the American public, while his policies will not resolve the frustrations being felt by the section of the American public that supports him.
In the coming days, Donald Trump and his transition team will pick personnel for key cabinet positions — including secretary of state, secretary of defense, secretary of commerce and secretary of treasury, as well as a handful of non-cabinet positions, such as national security advisor and US trade representative. These will be important to watch they will give clues on how his administration will handle key strategic issues. Trump is expected to appoint people who are more ideologically in sync with his so-called ‘America First’ trade and foreign policies and this will be a good indicator for What Trump plans to deliver on and what will remain as campaign rhetoric.
[1] Trump’s Dominance in the GOP Isn’t What It Seems – POLITICO
[2] RNC votes to install Trump’s handpicked chair, Michael Whatley | AP News
[3] Many GOP billionaires balked at Jan. 6. They’re coming back to Trump. – The Washington Post
[6] Bidenomics doesn’t tell full story of hardships facing middle class
[7] Trump’s Brazen Pact with the 0.001 Per Cent | The New Yorker