Donald Trump shocked the world but not his supporters and now rockets into the White House with a mandate.
Some say he ran on nothing but his own overblown personality. Not so. Yes, he was supercharged by waging war against the media and the establishment and supposedly suffocating political correctness, but what distinguished him through the Republican primaries, and what he mostly stuck to through the general election, were a series of marquee pledges that will now become his governing agenda.
And he will have pressure to get those things accomplished given that the Senate and House both remain in Republican hands.
Build that wall along the United States’ southern border, he’s promised — with a prediction that he can get it done within 18 months. It’s an immensely complex endeavor, far harder than Trump’s simple sell, but now, if he doesn’t get it done, and doesn’t get our southern neighbor to pay for it, he’s failed.
Donald Trump elected 45th President of U.S.
Donald Trump now has to live up to the promises that got him to the White House.
(JEFF KOWALSKY/AFP/Getty Images)Shred or rework trade agreements with Mexico, China and many other countries — and if companies leave for overseas, hit them with huge tariffs.
Deport, deport, deport — if not en masse, through a federal deportation force, at least expulsions in numbers far greater than the records President Obama already set.
Dismantle Obamacare, which has eliminated discrimination based on preexisting conditions, given 20 million additional Americans health insurance and, though you wouldn’t know it, bent the overall cost curve. What does it get replaced with? “Something terrific,” TBD.
Pass a huge tax cut, roughly double the one George W. Bush sponsored, that delivers a windfall to the wealthiest Americans and a relative paltry sum to the middle class, never mind the debt-inflating impact.
Russia celebrates as Trump takes White House on Election Day
Bring back jobs, especially manufacturing jobs, that have fled the country over the past few decades.
Smash ISIS, though he hasn’t said how, and impose some form of extreme vetting test to keep out people who seem like they might be violent extremist Muslims.
Trump predicted he could build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border in 18 months.
(Matt York/ASSOCIATED PRESS)Build up the military — make it bigger and stronger than it’s ever been, costing billions upon billions, but who’s counting.
Ensure that “the crime and violence that today afflicts our nation will soon come to an end” — a pledge made in his nomination acceptance speech — by restoring law and order. How? Who knows. And revive inner cities that he says have become hell holes. How? Again, who knows.
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And speaking of law and order, there’s that other promise: to make Hillary Clinton pay dearly for the crimes Trump is absolutely convinced, judgment of the FBI be damned, that she committed.
The Donald also vowed to crush ISIS.
(© Stringer . / Reuters/REUTERS)Just as Barack Obama entered the White House with a mandate for change and a Congress in his corner, Donald Trump has his own. He will now be expected to accomplish huge things.
“We will have so much winning if I get elected that you may get bored with the winning.”
Over to you, Mr. President-elect.
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