There is no doubt that Donald Trump is one of the most controversial figures of the 21st century. Thanks to his character and media bias, the 45th president of the United States has simultaneously become the most loved and most hated man in the world. As a result, his legacy will also be portrayed in significantly different ways.
His successes cover two main areas:
Prior to the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, the American economy experienced strong GDP and job growth. Trump’s Tax Cuts and Jobs Act in December 2017 provided major tax breaks to corporations and wealthier individuals. The policy, among other things, reduced the corporate income tax rate from 35% to 21%, and the top individual tax rate dropped from 39.6% to 37%. This boosted economic growth and helped reduce the unemployment rate to a 50 year low of 3.5% in February 2020. The Tax Foundation has indicated that those who earn more than 95% of the population will receive a 2.2% increase in after-tax income. Those in the 20% to 80% range would receive a 1.7% increase. As a result, the Trump administration significantly benefitted the American worker, as average hourly earnings surpassed all-time highs in March 2019. The net worth of all Americans rose to $128 trillion through September of 2020, which is up almost 30% in four years. This rise in wealth can be largely attributed to the rising valuations of stock portfolios, homes, farms, and properties. It reflects the rising profitability of both large and small American businesses. The Trump administration increased the overall prosperity of Americans before the onset of Covid-19.
Contrary to the media’s painted picture of Trump as a tyrant, Donald Trump is the first President since Jimmy Carter (US president from 1977-1981) to not involve the US in a new war or conflict and is now one of only 4 US presidents to achieve this. Among other diplomatic achievements, Trump mediated on Abraham Accords, which have seen four Arab nations establish relations with Israel and have reduced Middle East tensions.
Trump also became the first president to walk on North Korean soil and agreed to withdraw nearly 2500 troops from Afghanistan and Iraq. His diplomatic track record was imperfect, as his dealings with China produced a mixed bag of results. The US trade deficit with China needed to be addressed, and it was reduced incrementally. However, his rationale behind the trade war of bringing manufacturing jobs back to America did not materialise. While his diplomatic record was not perfect, it was much better than anything that the media or Democrats had anticipated.
His failures (arguably) cover two main areas:
Many people believe that the media was too harsh on Trump. This may be true. However, it must be said that the media may not have been so harsh if he wasn’t so ruthless towards the media also. Had Trump decided not to entice the media, then we could have seen many news agencies reduce their hated towards Trump. This would have perhaps resulted in a more united nation, which in turn could have reduced the extreme amount of social unrest that was caused in the latter stages of his term in office and possibly increase the chances of his re-election. Sadly, the consequences of Trump and the media’s mutual hatred have threatened democracy and peace across the United States, and the fruit of these actions could bear throughout the course of the decade.
Trump made little effort to win over those who voted against him. He often used Twitter as a platform to rub his success in his opposition’s faces or remind them of their stupidity. Trump subsequently became increasingly hated among those who opposed him, and his “sore-winner” attitude caused an increased voter turnout among liberals in the 2020 US election. During the 2020 election, Trump displayed to the world that he was not only a sore-winner but also a sore-loser by blaming his loss to Biden on voter fraud (from which no evidence was delivered). The sore-loser side of his legacy was further portrayed in his refusal to attend Biden’s inauguration.
Trump pleased his voters by carrying out the policy implementations to address perceived issues that he pitched to his voters during his campaign. Some of these actions were clamping down on immigration, reducing taxes, cutting funding to Planned Parenthood, and implementing trade tariffs on China. However, like every politician, he had his fair share of unfulfilled promises, such as reducing US sovereign debt. Despite Trump’s policy achievements and shortfalls, his legacy will likely be poor due to the divided nature of the US, as proven in the riots and chaos that occurred during the 2020 election. Trump’s unwillingness to be gracious in defeat to Biden will likely further damage his legacy, as he lives up to the personality stereotype of wealthy New York businessmen.
Facts • Balance • Context
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. These cookies ensure basic functionalities and security features of the website, anonymously.
Cookie | Duration | Description |
---|---|---|
Cloudflare | 1 month | The cookie is used by cdn services like CloudFlare to identify individual clients behind a shared IP address and apply security settings on a per-client basis. It does not correspond to any user ID in the web application and does not store any personally identifiable information. |
Cloudflare Always Online | This cookie is set by the provider Cloudflare content delivery network. This cookie is used for determining whether it should continue serving "Always Online" until the cookie expires. | |
Cookie Consent | 1 year | The cookie is set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin and is used to store whether or not user has consented to the use of cookies. It does not store any personal data. |
Login Paywall | 1 month | This cookie keeps track on whether the user is logged in and can view content. |
Other uncategorized cookies are those that are being analyzed and have not been classified into a category as yet.
Cookie | Duration | Description |
---|---|---|
Google Analytics: Persistence | 2 years | This cookie is installed by Google Analytics. The cookie is used to persist session state. |
Stripe M | 2 years | This cookie is set by Stripe payment gateway. This cookie is used to enable payment on the website without storing any patment information on a server. |
Stripe MID | 1 year | This cookie is set by Stripe payment gateway. This cookie is used to enable payment on the website without storing any payment information on a server. |
Stripe SID | 30 minutes | This cookie is set by Stripe payment gateway. This cookie is used to enable payment on the website without storing any payment information on a server. |
Analytical cookies are used to understand how visitors interact with the website. These cookies help provide information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc.
Cookie | Duration | Description |
---|---|---|
Google Analytics | 2 years | This cookie is installed by Google Analytics. The cookie is used to calculate visitor, session, campaign data and keep track of site usage for the site's analytics report. The cookies store information anonymously and assign a randomly generated number to identify unique visitors. |
Performance cookies are used to understand and analyze the key performance indexes of the website which helps in delivering a better user experience for the visitors.
Cookie | Duration | Description |
---|---|---|
Amazon Load Balancer for Stockdio | 7 days | AWSALB is a cookie generated by the Application load balancer in the Amazon Web Services. It is used by the Stockdio Stock Ticker. |
Amazon Load Balancer for Stockdio | 7 days | This cookie is used for load balancing services provded by Amazon inorder to optimize the user experience. Amazon has updated the ALB and CLB so that customers can continue to use the CORS request with stickness. It is used by Stockdio Stock Ticker. |
Advertisement cookies are used to provide visitors with relevant ads and marketing campaigns. These cookies track visitors across websites and collect information to provide customized ads.
Cookie | Duration | Description |
---|---|---|
Google NID | 6 months | NID cookie is a third party cookie automatically placed by Google services. To opt-out please visit https://adssettings.google.co.uk |
These cookies are used by the GDPR Cookie Consent Plugin. They only store whether the user has opted in or out of other categories. They do not store any personal data.
Cookie | Duration | Description |
---|---|---|
Cookie Consent: Analytics | 1 year | This cookies is set by GDPR Cookie Consent Plugin. The cookie is used to remember the user consent for the cookies under the category "Analytics". It does not store any personal data. |
Cookie Consent: Necessary | 1 year | This cookies is set by GDPR Cookie Consent Plugin. The cookie is used to remember the user consent for the cookies under the category "Necessary". It does not store any personal data. |
Cookie Consent: Others | 1 year | This cookies is set by GDPR Cookie Consent Plugin. The cookie is used to remember the user consent for the cookies under the category "Others". It does not store any personal data. |
Cookie Consent: Performance | 1 year | This cookies is set by GDPR Cookie Consent Plugin. The cookie is used to remember the user consent for the cookies under the category "Performance". It does not store any personal data. |