Trump has won the presidency again. The American people have proven once more that they are, in the majority, outrageously poor judges of character as well as full of hate, fear, and bigotry. The Republicans now hold the Presidency, the Senate, the majority of state Governorships, and the Supreme Court: the House of Congress is almost certain to end in their hands as well. I am, to put it mildly, disappointed.
So what now? What can we expect in the upcoming four years starting in January of 2025? I have no crystal ball, but I have some thoughts. And think it might be interesting to look back on this post in a few years, assuming I survive to 2028, to see how many things I worried about came to pass. My thinking here is based on what Trump has said, the contents of Project 2025, and my own speculation.
The near certainties
It’s legal if he does it…
Trump’s first term was constrained by at least some efforts to ‘educate’ and constrain the worst impulses of the man. This time all such limitations on his worst impulses will be gone: only real Trump loyalists will remain. Trump will enforce a ‘loyalty (to Trump)’ test on every appointee, and will replace FBI security clearance investigations with something he controls more directly.
Trump will pardon himself of the crimes he has been found guilty of and dissolve any and all further investigations into his activities. He will also pardon any of his loyalists who can in some way serve him. During his term he will use the ‘anything the president does is legal’ card over and over again. A non-stop series of unsupportable criminal investigations will be opened into people that offend Trump’s ego.
Every possible opportunity to stack the judiciary, particularly the Supreme Court, with extreme right-wing judges will be taken. Any possibility of restoring a woman’s right to control her own body via elective abortion will be curtailed. Legal mechanisms for punishment of people for not being white will be increased and hardened.
Tyrants are the best people
Anything that Russia wants will be largely granted. Ukraine will lose all American aid, and Russia will gain whatever part of the Ukraine that they want. This would likely extend to allowing Russia to use any and all military force against the Ukrainian people.
Tariffs will be introduced haphazardly on foreign imports, with the heaviest ones being applied to Chinese manufactured goods. As anyone with a brain knows, tariffs aren’t a tax on foreign nations- they are a tax on the people. Inflation will go up as a result of this basic misunderstanding, reversing the declines of the past couple of years. Any attempts to ‘re-launch’ American manufacturing will largely fail due to the immense cost involved and the lack of people willing to work for two dollars an hour.
Poors and coloured folks should know their place…
Many immigrants will be arrested and expelled from the country for tenuous reasons. A lot of these people will be terribly mistreated with at least some gathered into ‘temporary relocation camps’. There will be no one to replace these low-cost workers, adding another inflationary pressure.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr will be put in charge of parts of government dealing with the health and wellness of the American people. As a result these complex and important bureaucracies will be broadly disrupted and weakened. Education will also be defunded and made increasingly biased against the poor. Any government bodies related to the environment, particularly those that deal in fact-based scientific approaches, will be rendered powerless.
Grift
Trump will find numerous ways to enrich himself at the expense of the American people. In particular I expect he will find ways to increase the value of his Truth Social stock by making it the ‘official’ voice of the federal government. I also suspect he will prevent any laws that curtail his World Liberty Financial crypto-scam and similar cryptocurrency adjacent companies. Both Trump Social and World Liberty will be convenient ways for people to funnel bribes directly to Trump.
The pretty darned likely
Isolationism
The U.S. will effectively leave NATO and any organization relating to the global environment. Any attempts to curtail the actions of the non-democratic and tyrannical nations of the world will be halted. Russia in particular will have a field day with this: other nations that were once members of the USSR will be invaded once the Ukraine war is settled in Russia’s favour.
China will invade Taiwan and, after some initial sabre-rattling, Trump will be convinced that Taiwan was always part of China to begin with. The U.S. might even reduce some of the tariffs against China at this point in order to encourage them to make the take over as peaceful as possible.
Make America Sick Again
The spread of common diseases of the past like measles and mumps will become increasingly common. Numerous food-based emergencies will occur with little or no government oversight. Large corporations will take advantage of weakened enforcement by dumping dangerous effluent into critical water sources, thereby reducing operating costs and increasing profit.
It worked so well with the Japanese
The ‘immigrant internment camps’ will become a reality with Trump invoking the ‘Alien Enemies Act’ of 1798 and the Japanese internment camps under Executive Order 9066 as his justification. Hundreds of thousands of ‘illegal’ immigrants will be arrested and held in what are effectively prison camps. Efforts to move these people out of the U.S. will stall as there are few if any legal mechanisms to move people ‘back to where they came from’.
Tens of billions of dollars will be spent on arresting, moving, and housing these immigrants awaiting deportation. People will die due to mis-management.
It’s the economy, stupid
U.S. inflation rates will skyrocket well beyond 10%. Inflationary pressures from the import tariffs and the immigrant round up will push the rate towards 20%. Large corporations and billionaires will see increased profits, and the stock market will likely go up. Note that anyone who thinks the stock market is ‘rational’ is an ignoramus.
All the best dictators do it
Trump will have military parades in front of the White House. The missiles and tanks will make him feel like a big boy!
The worst case scenarios
Holy state of Trumpistan
Legal protections for non-Christians, women, and gender-diversity will be softened or removed. The rights of women to equal pay for employment will be eliminated. Abortion of all kinds for any reason will be outlawed. Laws pertaining to unionization will be curtailed. These changes will be enacted in ways that will take decades to reverse if or when a less extremist government takes power.
Pandemic 2.0
Another pandemic will arise, but this time the CDC and FDA will be more or less completely broken by RFK’s meddling. There will be no effective efforts to prevent transmission, no new vaccine will be developed, and no mandatory vaccination program implemented. Tens of millions will die this time instead of just a couple of million.
It worked so well with the Jews
The ‘immigrant internment camps’ will grow to house millions of people- Trump has talked about arresting 10 or 15 million. The cost will become overwhelming due to the challenges of expelling people back to their countries of origin. Some of the detainees will be forced into labour just as criminals are to ‘pay their way’. Someone will promote the idea of a more final solution to the immigrant problem. Trump will float this idea as a ‘joke’, but I suspect it is a step too far for the vast majority of Americans.
People who disagree with Trump or his government will be silenced with force on the grounds of treason or sedition. The term limits for presidency will be eliminated. The Republican party will grant themselves the right to appoint a new President.
If you have ’em, why not use ’em
A war will start somewhere that bothers Trump. This time there will be no wiser heads to stop him from using nuclear weapons. I mean, why have them if you don’t use them? This is exactly the question he asked of the generals and advisors in his previous term who have since called him dangerously unstable, ignorant, and outright stupid.
Conclusion
I don’t think the second Trump presidency will result in the end of the world. But the fact that he has been elected at all is an inarguable demonstration that the voting public in the United States has, in the majority, lost all interest in hope, kindness, and rational thought.
Granting Trump and the people that surround him full access to the levers of power for four years means that irreparable damage will be done to U.S. democracy. What remains in 2029 will be a nation of fearful cowardice with hatred, cruelty, and bigotry baked in to its bureaucratic systems. Recovering from that will be a monumental challenge- assuming it is even possible.
The good news is that roughly 50% of American voters did not vote for Trump- there are lots of good people left in that country. And some of these good people work throughout the various bureaucracies that perform the actual job of government. They will, I expect, use the rules and law to limit the damage elected officials can do.
I expect there will be some heroes who will stand against the worst of Trump’s excesses even in his own party, although they seem to lack anything akin to backbone. Republicans aren’t inherently bad people, they are (to quote Jessica Rabbit) just drawn that way.
There will be lots of opportunities for the ‘checks and balances’ of the U.S. democratic system to be tested once again and, if I’m optimistic, those controls will hold back the worst of the flood. We’ll see how much of this optimism still holds in a few years.
I really can’t argue with your predictions. I have grave concerns regarding the US not supporting Ukraine and the consequences of the nation effectively opting out of NATO. Trade tariffs will certainly cause problems and in conjunction with other issues such as poor crop yields due to freak weather and other factors, could trigger a EU wide recession. Bad news for the UK as we now find themselves outside of the EU and isolated from them as well as the US.
You are absolutely right, Roger- a lot can go terribly wrong globally with an irrational, fact-hating transactional narcissist in charge of the world’s most powerful nation. I think one of the things that bothers me the most, though, is that Trump’s victory is taken as more empowerment by the darkest political elements in other nations.
Yep, it sucks to be us.
I wish I had some encouraging sentiment to share, Lou. I would say “at least he can’t be elected again”, but with his greasy little fingers on the levers of power even that might not be true. And saying “only half of American voters voted for him” is not exactly a positive thing to say: when you know that every second adult you see thought he was the best choice, it really makes you question humanity.
Oh well: America is strong. With some luck whatever happens over the next four years will help the nation learn to be better.