Domestic
Recently, Donald Trump was elected as president of the United States along with a Republican majority in the Senate and the House of Representatives. All of this combined with the Supreme Court’s conservative majority creates a government aligned with Donald Trump and his policies for the foreseeable future. The previous Republicans that revolved around George W. Bush, have no more influence nor control over their own party. The next four years could be historic, as it may decide the economic future of the nation, the manner that power of the executive branch is used (or abused), and the future dynamics of the Republican Party.
The Republican Party is now the Trump Party
The Republican party will never be the same as it was 20 years ago; no more of the “Compassionate Conservatives” famously described by former president George W. Bush. The Republican Party is fully under control of Trump’s policies and ideology and could be for decades to come. The Donald Trump fever will outlive him as his ideas remain relevant to new large figures within the Republican Party such as Vivek Ramaswamy and Ron DeSantis, who both struggled to differentiate their policies from Trump in the primaries. Trump drew the largest percentage of votes from men and women under 30 for the Republican Party since the presidential election of 2008. Most of these voters decided based on their current standard of living. If Donald Trump can improve the standard of living or at least convince these voters to stay on his side, then he would be seen as a Ronald Regan-esque political figure and a model for future presidents ready to embrace his political and economic policies. This has already been seen with the adoption of neo-liberalism by both Democratic and Republican presidential administrations after Ronald Regan.
The last resistance within the Republican Party was vanquished in the primaries and Trump is now on top. To be a candidate in the current Republican Party would require relating to his base of populist voters. The view of this new consistently pro-Trump party is anti-immigration, protectionist, and aloof in foreign policy.
In contrast, George W. Bush of the old Republican party condemned his own party. Bush stated back in 2021 in a TV interview, “It’s a beautiful country we have. And yet, it’s not beautiful when we condemn [and] call people names and scare people about immigration,” just as Trump notably has. The former president criticized the anti-immigrant fear-mongering that brings a nativist culture to the Republican party. Along with this, the former vice president under – or maybe over – Bush, Dick Cheney, endorsed the Democrats in the 2024 election. Many others who were prominent Republican figureheads pre-Trump have decided to rally against the party they fought for about a decade ago.
Regardless, all the criticism from former allies of the Republican party means nothing now that Trump has control. The political currents within the party will now revolve around Trump and whoever embraces his policies and manners of governance within the United States.
Corporate Control
The corporate classes of America have long been tied to the government in some form through contracts and lobbyists. In the future, corporations will be tied more closely to the government as these contracts are weaponized, leading to an economic version of the spoils system where the most loyal corporation gets the contract. This would require corporations, and especially news organizations, to balance catering to their customer base and their loyalty to the ruling party. This was already seen with the Washington Post as it refused to make a presidential endorsement for the first time in 32 years. The owner of the Post is notable billionaire Jeff Bezos who might be in trouble if one of his assets goes directly against Donald Trump.
Federal contracts make up most of the adhesion between private enterprises and the government. Along with this, the new government under Trump can force corporations to adhere to policies that could align these companies to the new Republican Party. Federal contracts are unique in the way that the federal government has a vague set of reasons to terminate a contract, and can do so with substantial ease. This makes the companies who wish to keep their contracts bargain with the government and adopt whatever social policy the executive branch wishes. Trump has been eager to use these strategies since his first election in 2016. However, there are ongoing debates over how much power Trump has over these contracts and whether it extends to the special ability for the government to cancel them if they do not fit the interests of the country.
Elon Musk, the billionaire who is the CEO of Tesla, Starlink, and X, is also now Trump’s right-hand man. All of the recent cabinet picks have been “carried out with the approval of Musk,” including Musk’s own “Department of Government Efficiency.” Musk’s influence in the appointments of these positions and his close relationship with the president-elect makes him one of the most powerful people of this decade. The manner in which the government will be carried out will be one with raw ambition, impulsive behavior, and a coating of foolish activity to desensitize the American public to the consequences of the government’s actions. Musk could also use his social platforms to his advantage, influencing the minds of the American people.
The Democracy Question
The primary question in the minds of the weary American population is whether Trump will end the democracy of the United States as we know it and turn it into an autocratic government. The answer to this is probably not, as democracy does not come on a yes or no basis, but a spectrum between authoritarian and pure democracy. It is not likely that there will be an absolute takeover, but most likely a few bills or executive orders will be passed that undermine the democratic system to some extent.
Many presidents in history have tried their best to bend or break the rules of the Constitution in order to carry out desired policies or to keep power over the American people; Trump has only demonstrated this more openly as to desensitize the public to breaking the rules of the Executive office. Watergate-esque scandals become a normal occurrence to the point that the public is no longer shocked by their occurrence. It is not so abnormal if rule breaking happens all the time and will become more “presidential” the more Trump does it.
The End of What Era?
With Trump and his cronies having majority control over the government, this is the end of the system of neoliberal capitalism and politics. Starting with Ronald Regan, America embraced an economic system with little government ownership, free trade, minimal public spending, and economic deregulation, combined with low taxes. Economic and foreign intervention is still carried out by the government in times of need under neoliberal economics. The United States’s neoliberal economic and political system will in the coming years be dismantled by the ideology of Trumpist populism. This new ideology seeks large tariffs in order to bring industry jobs to the United States and an isolationist foreign policy, but continues on with economic deregulation, minimizing public spending, and low taxes.
Trump plans on increasing tariffs on all imports to “protect” American manufacturing and create a “manufacturing renaissance.” This would be a move that could potentially either hurt the economy through inflation or create more manufacturing jobs that benefit the economy of our nation. Either effect could happen, but it does depend on how these tariffs are used as the U.S. has been in reliance on cheaply-made foreign goods for a long time. Tariffs drive up the price of these foreign goods which is a way to raise inflation greatly as the American products must keep up with demand. To expand American industry would also require large foreign investments.
The economic era before neoliberalism was Keynesianism, which developed the United States from the New Deal until its end and the implementation of neoliberalism in the 1980’s. This system of economics focused less on the free market and more on the social employment and rights of the American worker in order to stabilize prices throughout the period. This is marked by government regulation within the private sector, more specifically banking, in order to stabilize and grow the economy at a balanced pace. This system proved useless in international economic turmoil such as the oil crisis and stagflation of the 1970’s.
Similarly, Neoliberalism has seemed to have failed the United States in the midst of the Great Recession, rising housing prices, and a lack of growth in American wages as inflation takes its toll. The American people are not happy with the current economic outlook and they seek change in populism sponsored by Trump.
The changing economic outlook in the United States will not lead to much prosperity for the American people, let alone the American worker. Tariffs, if they are intense as they are promised to be, will be too much for the American economy as Trump tries to revive long lost manufacturing jobs. Inflation will stay as a major issue when politics and economics join together in debates. Elon Musk will seek some sort of power within the Trump Administration and this could be the breaking moment of his career. Musk’s involvement also hints towards seeking to bring corporations into the right-wing fold. The world must prepare for the end of the American Century and what powers will try to rise as a result. Hope, again, depends upon whether the right people get into the right jobs, in order to create prosperity manufactured by a bargain with the devil.
International
America will likely have an isolationist stance in the coming years in order to prevent what are perceived to be long, dragged-out conflicts that waste resources for the country, hurting U.S. allies in need across the world. In Syria, for example, Trump abandoned loyal Kurdish allies who were key to the defeat of ISIS in the region in 2017 but needed to be defended from threatening powers such as Turkey, who invaded the region as soon as the U.S. pulled troops out. Trump was criticized even by close Republican allies on this decision. Trump has also been vocal in the past years to his opposition of NATO and its defense clause, considering NATO’s member states to be freeloading off the United States. Trump’s foreign policy is similar to that of the interwar period, with an isolationist stance on military involvement giving free reign to new and rising world powers.
Europe
With an unreliable ally like the United States in the future, European nations will seek a military buildup to defend from the military and energy threats of Russia and China. Europe will be brought closer together in the absence of the United States.
Russia and Ukraine
The Russo-Ukrainian war will end in some form as a stalemate for both sides. Trump and supporters have been critics of sending aid to Ukraine since the war began and claim that Europe needs to step up its aid. Nonetheless, Ukraine will probably receive more aid from European nations, and there will be nothing for Russia to do about the state of its army nor its ability to win this war.
The nuclear arsenal of Russia will have little likelihood of being used to end this war quickly as there is no reason that the Russian military high command would carry out such an order. Putin has the authority to command a Russian nuclear strike, but that command must go through the high command first and would not align with the nuclear doctrine set in place. Unless the Russian high command believes that a nuclear strike has happened against Russia or its allies, nuclear facilities are attacked, or that a conventional war has placed the continued existence of the state in jeopardy, there is no just reason to use nuclear weapons. Even if a Russian first strike were to occur, that would cause retaliation from other nuclear powers in Europe such as the United Kingdom or France.
The Middle East
With the lack of U.S. enforcement in the region, the Middle East will stay an unstable region, and its fate will be determined by the decisions of Iran, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Egypt, and Israel. However, the United States will probably try to keep light influence within the region in order to protect oil prices.
The conflicts in the region have no sign of letting up with Trump in the White House. Israel has been a close ally to the United States for many years, and in Trump’s first term, he recognized the controversial Israeli settlements in the West Bank. The IDF will have little resistance from the United States in Gaza. Along with the conflict in Gaza, there is the Yemeni Civil War, which is fought between Iran-backed Houthi forces, a terrorist group that raided shipping lanes in the Red Sea, and Saudi-backed forces. Although, Saudi Arabia largely pulled support. Trump in his previous term did not care much about the conflict but did openly support Saudi forces in the region. The Houthi faction in the region will survive judging on the Saudi withdrawal and the Trump administration’s history of keeping militarily uninvolved.
Energy prices have been especially important for the United States since the energy crises of the 1970’s that caused rampant inflation. In the past 50 years, the United States has been trying to be self-sufficient in oil production to thwart a weakness that has become a major political issue. While wanting to keep out of the Middle East militarily, a presence must be kept for oil operations to continue production just as military presence was kept to protect oil operations during the Iraq-Iran war of the 1980’s. Despite the United States being energy independent, a more neutral stance in the Middle East would be beneficial for stable oil prices as in the past most of the oil embargos have been sparked by Western support for Israel.
Asia
China will seek greater power within the region and especially in Taiwan, a nation the CCP wishes to bring into its fold.
Also, China will be pushed to initiate a practice of de-dollarization, limiting the power of the U.S. dollar within the Chinese economy in order to defend from sanctions or other economic tricks that the new United States leadership could use. Furthermore, the Belt and Road Initiative will expand with even less resistance from the United States because of its isolationist policies. China currently does not seek the Yuan to be a global reserve currency, but with a soon-to-be rapidly changing economic policy in the United States, many nations will probably seek an alternative currency.
