Eight years ago, my classmates discussed how little they knew about President Donald Trump. Four years ago, there was a great amount of stigma towards voting for Trump. However, there has been a cultural shift on the political spectrum in the last four years. It is more normal today than four and eight years ago to support Trump — something evident in the recent election results, the media and even on Tulane University’s campus. Anti-woke culture has become ever present in the cultural landscape of America and a whole subgroup of Joe Rogan-adjacent Gen Z men have risen to vote for the former “The Apprentice” host.
What details of Trump’s first term did current voters forget that made them go from hating the candidate to eventually forgetting and voting for him? Let’s look at the important moments of the 2016 presidential term — the bad and the good.
Significant setbacks during Trump’s presidency include the two complete government shutdowns under his term. One of the shutdowns started when the U.S. Congress rejected funding for a proposed border plan. The shutdown lasted 35 days, leaving many Americans without pay for more than a month.
Fiscally, it is hard to say Trump accomplished much. Trump’s fiscal policies did more for the top 1% than the average American. The national debt increased by almost $7.8 trillion, mostly due to major tax cuts for the rich and large corporations.
In a similar vein, Trump’s labor policies were harmful to citizens and did more to benefit the wealthy. The American jobs he vowed to protect dropped by nearly $2.9 million, the worst job numbers of any president. His proposed tariffs aimed to promote American manufacturing but led to increased costs of goods and minimal new jobs.
Trump’s insurance policies were equally harmful. His work to undermine the Affordable Care Act’s proposed protections for pre-existing conditions led to increased rates or removal of insurance altogether for nearly 130 million Americans.
One of his most damaging opinions came out of his calling climate change a “hoax.” He removed almost 100 environmental protections to benefit larger corporations and pulled out of the Paris climate agreement. These actions led to possibly irreversible damage to the environment.
People have been quick to forget Trump’s collusion concerning Ukraine and Russia. Trump effectively blackmailed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky by threatening to withhold $400 million in aid if Ukraine did not help in an unneeded investigation into Biden’s family. This financial delay deeply weakened Ukraine before Russia’s invasion. The scheme was illegal and those who tried to stop him were fired or had their careers dragged through the mud. He then asked the U.S. Department of State to deny U.S. Congressional subpoenas. All of this led to his first impeachment where he was charged with abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.
Trump was also heavily intertwined with Russia, which culminated in a large investigation called the “Report On The Investigation Into Russian Interference In The 2016 Presidential Election,” or the Mueller report. To stop the investigation, Trump pressured former FBI Director James Comey to intervene. When met with resistance, Trump fired him. Trump then attempted to fire the lead investigator, Robert Mueller, but did not have the power to do so. He subsequently tried to hide that he attempted to fire him by falsifying records and ordering his staff to hide emails. This seems ironic, as he called for former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s emails to be searched in 2016. He was never convicted for obstruction of justice due to the U.S. Department of Justice’s policies, but more than a thousand former federal prosecutors signed a letter outlining the evidence that would have convicted him. Not that it would have mattered, given that Trump has been convicted of committing nearly 34 felonies during his term and barely faced consequences.
His second impeachment came from his actions that led to the Jan. 6 insurrection. Trump claimed that the 2020 presidential election was fraudulent even before election officials certified the election. Even after the results were certified, he continued this narrative, going as far as ordering the Department of Justice to label the election as corrupt. Trump’s public denial of the election results, as well as his tweets led to an organized mob raiding the capital. This eventually led to Trump being charged with inciting an insurrection.
What about the good? Trump’s biggest accomplishment was his Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which cut taxes, even if it skewed toward America’s wealthy. ISIS leader Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi was killed under his term, and Trump was a great asset to Israel. He generally promoted a better Middle East; his best act was putting Iran into debt, which, regrettably, Biden has not continued. Trump also accomplished some major criminal justice reform during his first term, making United States prisons less harsh in general.
Ultimately, during his first term, Trump’s negatives outweighed the positives. Looking to the future, it is clear this is a different Trump — he is more organized and has garnered an inner circle that he is more likely to stick with. Trump has a majority Republican Congress meaning he will pass bills efficiently with limited resistance. He has teamed up with individuals like Elon Musk and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and has a more honed PR strategy. This makes me believe that this term will be different from his first, whether that will be for the greater good or the demise of this country.
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