Presidents and Populism: Donald J. Trump
The recent world-wide populist trend reached its pinnacle in November of 2016 with the election of Donald John Trump as President of the United States. Born on June 14, 1946, Trump hailed from the Queens borough of New York City. He had an economics degree from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, but had never held any elected political office, cabinet position or high military rank. For four and a half decades, he had ran The Trump Organization, a real estate and construction firm founded by his paternal grandmother. During his business career, Trump had built, renovated, and managed numerous office towers, hotels, casinos, and golf courses. His surname was the brand for various products and properties. He owned the Miss USA and Miss Universe pageants from 1996 to 2015, and he hosted The Apprentice, a reality television series on NBC, from 2004 to 2015. As of 2017, Forbes listed him as the 544th wealthiest person in the world (201st in the United States) with a net worth of $3.5 billion.
Trump first publicly expressed interest in running for political office in 1987. He won two Reform Party presidential primaries in 2000, but withdrew his candidacy early on. In June 2015, he launched his campaign for the 2016 presidential election, and quickly emerged as the front-runner among 17 candidates in the Republican primaries. In July he was formally nominated at the Republican National Convention. His campaign received unprecedented media coverage and international attention.
Trump formally announced his candidacy for President of the United States on June 16, 2015 at Trump Tower in Manhattan. In his speech, Trump drew attention to domestic issues such as illegal immigration, offshoring of American jobs, the U.S. national debt, and Islamic terrorism, all of which became themes of his campaign. He also announced his campaign slogan, "Make America Great Again". He maintained his dislike of political correctness, referring in his speech to how Mexico was sending criminals, rapists and drug dealers to the United States as illegal aliens.
Trump entered a field of 16 candidates who were vying for the 2016 Republican nomination, the largest presidential field in the party's history. He participated in eleven of the twelve Republican debates, skipping only the seventh debate on January 28, the last debate before primary voting began on February 1. The debates received record high television ratings, which increased the visibility of Trump's campaign. By early 2016, a number of candidates had withdrawn from the race, and with the leading candidates being Trump and Texas Senator Ted Cruz. On Super Tuesday, Trump won the plurality of the vote and remained the front-runner throughout the remainder of the primaries. After a landslide win in Indiana on May 3, 2016, the remaining candidates Ted Cruz and John Kasich suspended their presidential campaigns, and RNC Chairman Reince Priebus declared Trump the presumptive Republican nominee. With nearly 14 million votes, Trump broke the all-time record for winning the most primary votes in the history of the Republican Party.
After becoming the presumptive Republican nominee, Trump's focus shifted to the general election. He began targeting Hillary Clinton, who became the presumptive Democratic nominee on June 6, 2016, and continued to campaign across the country. That month, Secret Service agents prevented an assassination attempt on Trump during one of his rallies in Las Vegas when they seized a 20-year-old British man who was illegally residing in the U.S.
For most of 2016, Clinton was shown as having a significant lead in national polls over Trump, but in early July, Clinton's lead narrowed, following the FBI's re-opening of its investigation into alleged improprieties concerning her use of email while Secretary of State. FBI Director James Comey had stated that Clinton had been "extremely careless" in her handling of classified government material.
On July 15, 2016, Trump announced his selection of Indiana Governor Mike Pence as his running mate. Trump and Pence were officially nominated by the Republican Party on July 19, 2016, at the Republican National Convention. The convention speakers list had a conspicuous lack of many of the party's leading names with the only attendee who was a former presidential nominee being 1996 GOP candidate Bob Dole. None of the other prior nominees chose to attend. At the convention Trump officially accepted the nomination in a 76-minute speech that was watched by nearly 35 million people. In late July, Trump came close to Clinton in national polls following a 3 to 4 percentage point convention bounce. Clinton received a 7 percent convention bounce, and extended her lead over Trump in national polls at the start of August.
An issue during the campaign was Trump's failure to publicly release his full tax returns. Pursuant to FEC regulations, Trump published a 92-page financial disclosure form that listed all his assets, liabilities, income sources and hundreds of business positions. He said that his tax returns are being audited and his lawyers advise against release. Trump told the news media that his tax rate was "none of your business", adding, "I fight very hard to pay as little tax as possible." On October 1, 2016, the New York Times obtained three pages of Trump's 1995 tax return. They claimed that these showed that using allowed deductions for losses, Trump claimed a loss of $916 million on his 1995 federal tax returns. During the second presidential debate, Trump acknowledged using the deduction, but declined to provide details such as the specific years it was applied.
On September 26, 2016, Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton faced off in the first presidential debate at Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York. Lester Holt, an anchor with NBC News, was the moderator. This was the most watched presidential debate in United States history. The second presidential debate was held at Washington University in Saint Louis, Missouri. The beginning narrative of that debate was dominated by a leaked tape of Trump making lewd comments to NBC personality Billy Bush. Trump said that anything he had said as part of "locker room talk" paled in comparison to actual sexual misconduct by Bill Clinton and by Hillary Clinton's enabling of her husband's actions. Trump had invited four women who had accused Clinton of impropriety to a press conference prior to the debate. The final presidential debate was held at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas on October 19, where media buzz concerned Trump's refusal to say whether or not he would accept the result of the election, regardless of the outcome.
Trump's campaign espoused a number of positions that earned populist support. He said that he would renegotiate free trade agreements such as NAFTA and the Trans-Pacific Partnership, he would strongly enforce immigration laws, and would build a new wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. He also vowed to pursue energy independence while opposing climate change regulations such as the Clean Power Plan and the Paris Agreement, to modernize and expedite services for veterans, to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, to abolish Common Core education standards, to invest in infrastructure, to simplify the tax code while reducing taxes for all economic classes, and said that he would impose tariffs on imports by companies that send jobs offshore. He also called for a non-interventionist approach to foreign policy while increasing military spending. He also promised extreme vetting of immigrants from Muslim-majority countries as a means of preventing domestic Islamic terrorism, and said that he would pursue aggressive military action against Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL also known as ISIS).
Much was made in the media of Trump's relationship to Russia. During the campaign, Trump sometimes praised Russian president Vladimir Putin as a strong leader. Some of Trump's advisers, including former National Security Advisor Michael T. Flynn and former campaign manager Paul Manafort, were linked with Russian or Ukrainian officials. It has been allegfed that the Russian government attempted to intervene in the 2016 presidential election to favor the election of Trump by hacking into computers of Trumps' opponents.
Two days before the second presidential debate, a 2005 recording surfaced, made on a studio bus while preparing to film an episode of Access Hollywood. On the tape, Trump is heard bragging to the show's cohost Billy Bush about kissing and groping women. He is heard telling Bush, "I just start kissing them, I don't even wait. And when you're a star, they let you do it, you can do anything, grab them by the pussy." Trump was heavily criticized for his language on the tape. He responded with a public apology. Many Republicans withdrew their endorsements of his candidacy and some called for him to quit the race. Trump responded by alleging that Bill Clinton, former President of the United States and husband of Trump's Democratic rival Hillary Clinton, had "abused women" and that Hillary Clinton had bullied her husband's victims.
On Election Day, November 8, 2016, Trump received 306 electoral votes to Clinton's 232 votes. The counts were later adjusted to 304 and 227 respectively, after defections on both sides by faithless electors. In the early hours of November 9, Clinton called Trump to concede the election. Trump then delivered his victory speech before hundreds of supporters in the New York Hilton hotel. In his victory speech, Trump promised to heal the division caused by the election. He thanked Clinton for her service to the country, and promised to be a president to all Americans.
Trump received a smaller share of the popular vote than Clinton, making him the fifth person to be elected president after losing the popular vote. (The other four are John Quincy Adams, Rutherford Hayes, Benjamin Harrison and George W. Bush).
Trump's victory was considered a stunning political upset, as polls consistently showed Hillary Clinton leading nationwide as well as in most battleground states. Trump's support in these polls had been underestimated throughout his campaign. Trump won the perennial swing states of Florida, Iowa and Ohio. But he also won unexpected victories in the so-called "blue wall" states of Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, which had been Democratic strongholds since the 1990s. Trump's victory marked the return of a Republican White House combined with control of both houses of Congress.
Trump's victory sparked protests across the United States. On the Saturday following Trump's inauguration there were demonstrations protesting Trump in the United States and worldwide, with approximately 2,600,000 taking part in Women's Marches worldwide. Trump's supporters have compared his presidency to that of Richard Nixon, one confronted with large protests, but supported by a silent, less vocal electoral majority. Whatever opinion one holds of the President, his election has evoked considerable passion, both pro and con. His opponents have underestimated his appeal, both during the primaries and during the election campaign, as he was able to harness voter discontent with the status quo, the political and financial establishment and with the ever widening economic imbalance and wage gap.
Trump first publicly expressed interest in running for political office in 1987. He won two Reform Party presidential primaries in 2000, but withdrew his candidacy early on. In June 2015, he launched his campaign for the 2016 presidential election, and quickly emerged as the front-runner among 17 candidates in the Republican primaries. In July he was formally nominated at the Republican National Convention. His campaign received unprecedented media coverage and international attention.
Trump formally announced his candidacy for President of the United States on June 16, 2015 at Trump Tower in Manhattan. In his speech, Trump drew attention to domestic issues such as illegal immigration, offshoring of American jobs, the U.S. national debt, and Islamic terrorism, all of which became themes of his campaign. He also announced his campaign slogan, "Make America Great Again". He maintained his dislike of political correctness, referring in his speech to how Mexico was sending criminals, rapists and drug dealers to the United States as illegal aliens.
Trump entered a field of 16 candidates who were vying for the 2016 Republican nomination, the largest presidential field in the party's history. He participated in eleven of the twelve Republican debates, skipping only the seventh debate on January 28, the last debate before primary voting began on February 1. The debates received record high television ratings, which increased the visibility of Trump's campaign. By early 2016, a number of candidates had withdrawn from the race, and with the leading candidates being Trump and Texas Senator Ted Cruz. On Super Tuesday, Trump won the plurality of the vote and remained the front-runner throughout the remainder of the primaries. After a landslide win in Indiana on May 3, 2016, the remaining candidates Ted Cruz and John Kasich suspended their presidential campaigns, and RNC Chairman Reince Priebus declared Trump the presumptive Republican nominee. With nearly 14 million votes, Trump broke the all-time record for winning the most primary votes in the history of the Republican Party.
After becoming the presumptive Republican nominee, Trump's focus shifted to the general election. He began targeting Hillary Clinton, who became the presumptive Democratic nominee on June 6, 2016, and continued to campaign across the country. That month, Secret Service agents prevented an assassination attempt on Trump during one of his rallies in Las Vegas when they seized a 20-year-old British man who was illegally residing in the U.S.
For most of 2016, Clinton was shown as having a significant lead in national polls over Trump, but in early July, Clinton's lead narrowed, following the FBI's re-opening of its investigation into alleged improprieties concerning her use of email while Secretary of State. FBI Director James Comey had stated that Clinton had been "extremely careless" in her handling of classified government material.
On July 15, 2016, Trump announced his selection of Indiana Governor Mike Pence as his running mate. Trump and Pence were officially nominated by the Republican Party on July 19, 2016, at the Republican National Convention. The convention speakers list had a conspicuous lack of many of the party's leading names with the only attendee who was a former presidential nominee being 1996 GOP candidate Bob Dole. None of the other prior nominees chose to attend. At the convention Trump officially accepted the nomination in a 76-minute speech that was watched by nearly 35 million people. In late July, Trump came close to Clinton in national polls following a 3 to 4 percentage point convention bounce. Clinton received a 7 percent convention bounce, and extended her lead over Trump in national polls at the start of August.
An issue during the campaign was Trump's failure to publicly release his full tax returns. Pursuant to FEC regulations, Trump published a 92-page financial disclosure form that listed all his assets, liabilities, income sources and hundreds of business positions. He said that his tax returns are being audited and his lawyers advise against release. Trump told the news media that his tax rate was "none of your business", adding, "I fight very hard to pay as little tax as possible." On October 1, 2016, the New York Times obtained three pages of Trump's 1995 tax return. They claimed that these showed that using allowed deductions for losses, Trump claimed a loss of $916 million on his 1995 federal tax returns. During the second presidential debate, Trump acknowledged using the deduction, but declined to provide details such as the specific years it was applied.
On September 26, 2016, Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton faced off in the first presidential debate at Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York. Lester Holt, an anchor with NBC News, was the moderator. This was the most watched presidential debate in United States history. The second presidential debate was held at Washington University in Saint Louis, Missouri. The beginning narrative of that debate was dominated by a leaked tape of Trump making lewd comments to NBC personality Billy Bush. Trump said that anything he had said as part of "locker room talk" paled in comparison to actual sexual misconduct by Bill Clinton and by Hillary Clinton's enabling of her husband's actions. Trump had invited four women who had accused Clinton of impropriety to a press conference prior to the debate. The final presidential debate was held at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas on October 19, where media buzz concerned Trump's refusal to say whether or not he would accept the result of the election, regardless of the outcome.
Trump's campaign espoused a number of positions that earned populist support. He said that he would renegotiate free trade agreements such as NAFTA and the Trans-Pacific Partnership, he would strongly enforce immigration laws, and would build a new wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. He also vowed to pursue energy independence while opposing climate change regulations such as the Clean Power Plan and the Paris Agreement, to modernize and expedite services for veterans, to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, to abolish Common Core education standards, to invest in infrastructure, to simplify the tax code while reducing taxes for all economic classes, and said that he would impose tariffs on imports by companies that send jobs offshore. He also called for a non-interventionist approach to foreign policy while increasing military spending. He also promised extreme vetting of immigrants from Muslim-majority countries as a means of preventing domestic Islamic terrorism, and said that he would pursue aggressive military action against Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL also known as ISIS).
Much was made in the media of Trump's relationship to Russia. During the campaign, Trump sometimes praised Russian president Vladimir Putin as a strong leader. Some of Trump's advisers, including former National Security Advisor Michael T. Flynn and former campaign manager Paul Manafort, were linked with Russian or Ukrainian officials. It has been allegfed that the Russian government attempted to intervene in the 2016 presidential election to favor the election of Trump by hacking into computers of Trumps' opponents.
Two days before the second presidential debate, a 2005 recording surfaced, made on a studio bus while preparing to film an episode of Access Hollywood. On the tape, Trump is heard bragging to the show's cohost Billy Bush about kissing and groping women. He is heard telling Bush, "I just start kissing them, I don't even wait. And when you're a star, they let you do it, you can do anything, grab them by the pussy." Trump was heavily criticized for his language on the tape. He responded with a public apology. Many Republicans withdrew their endorsements of his candidacy and some called for him to quit the race. Trump responded by alleging that Bill Clinton, former President of the United States and husband of Trump's Democratic rival Hillary Clinton, had "abused women" and that Hillary Clinton had bullied her husband's victims.
On Election Day, November 8, 2016, Trump received 306 electoral votes to Clinton's 232 votes. The counts were later adjusted to 304 and 227 respectively, after defections on both sides by faithless electors. In the early hours of November 9, Clinton called Trump to concede the election. Trump then delivered his victory speech before hundreds of supporters in the New York Hilton hotel. In his victory speech, Trump promised to heal the division caused by the election. He thanked Clinton for her service to the country, and promised to be a president to all Americans.
Trump received a smaller share of the popular vote than Clinton, making him the fifth person to be elected president after losing the popular vote. (The other four are John Quincy Adams, Rutherford Hayes, Benjamin Harrison and George W. Bush).
Trump's victory was considered a stunning political upset, as polls consistently showed Hillary Clinton leading nationwide as well as in most battleground states. Trump's support in these polls had been underestimated throughout his campaign. Trump won the perennial swing states of Florida, Iowa and Ohio. But he also won unexpected victories in the so-called "blue wall" states of Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, which had been Democratic strongholds since the 1990s. Trump's victory marked the return of a Republican White House combined with control of both houses of Congress.
Trump's victory sparked protests across the United States. On the Saturday following Trump's inauguration there were demonstrations protesting Trump in the United States and worldwide, with approximately 2,600,000 taking part in Women's Marches worldwide. Trump's supporters have compared his presidency to that of Richard Nixon, one confronted with large protests, but supported by a silent, less vocal electoral majority. Whatever opinion one holds of the President, his election has evoked considerable passion, both pro and con. His opponents have underestimated his appeal, both during the primaries and during the election campaign, as he was able to harness voter discontent with the status quo, the political and financial establishment and with the ever widening economic imbalance and wage gap.