If… Donald Trump Wins a Second Term as President, What?

I think we can pretty much count Ron DeSantis out as a non-MAGA-acceptable second place GOP candidate whose polls numbers are falling faster than a skydiver at an air show. Absent Donald Trump’s conviction of a crime enumerated in the 14th Amendment – which would require a judicial determination that Mr Trump “shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies” of the United States – or his sustaining a physical impairment (death or material disability), there are no legal barriers against his winning the GOP nomination and hence running in the general election. And in case you think Trump’s return, if elected President, would follow his almost randomized policy patterns inherent in his past term of office, think again.

Aside from his pledges to take down those who have criticized or opposed him in a fury of “retribution” and commuting or pardoning all or most of the January 6th insurrectionists who were convicted of associated misdemeanors and felonies, some very serious, there are details afoot. Since Mr Trump is not recognized as a detailed policy thinker, there are about 172 people in a Ft Worth, Texas think tank – the America First Policy Institute (AFPI) – who are preparing detailed policy vectors for a second (coming?) Trump term. The Ft Worth staff includes eight former cabinet secretaries from the Trump administration and 20 other political appointees. It’s part of their America First philosophy, which does not carry that meaning to those who oppose MAGA beliefs.

For those naysayers, who cannot conceive of a Trump victory in 2024, I point to their track record in 2016, and as noted in my recent Americans, the Economy and Unhappiness blog, incumbent presidents, where 70% or more of major polling shows 70% or more pessimistic about the economy, usually do not get reelected. Despite his litany of economic success, Biden’s negative economic numbers are at 74% now. His age is an issue that won’t go away, something that is irrelevant to DJT whose followers worship him as their MAGA cult master. The thought of Biden’s dying in office and leaving a very unpopular Kamala Harris as president is also weighing heavily on many voters’ minds. Biden’s elderliness follows him around like a shadow.

MAGA has morphed from an ideology based on deep state conspiracy theories, some as bizarre as QAnon’s grooming pedophiles notion, into an all-out cult-worshipping cadre where logic is not even considered. Trump has even passed Pope Francis in palpable “infallibility.”

Facts are denied or superseded by more palatable “alternative facts” (i.e., convenient falsehoods). Every Trump indictment is turned into a “they’re coming for you too” witch hunt, which in turn becomes a campaign contribution mega-generator.

So, we know we are lumbered with a Supreme Court not limited by ethical requirements or qualms, appointed for life, undoing individual and civil rights as quickly as they can review cases, that threatens to be with us for decades. As 22% of Republicans do not believe that we can have fair elections (77% of Dems who think we can), there is a lot of anger, lots of guns, and simmering unrest with a real threat of a repetition of election denial quite possible.

But there is a real Trump second term platform being developed in detail by AFPI, and they are not particularly shy about touting it. The July 13th issue of The Economist reports: “Even at this early stage, the details are something to behold. Thousand-page policy documents set out ideas that were once outlandish in Republican circles but have now become orthodox: finishing the border wall, raising tariffs on allies and competitors alike, making unfunded tax cuts permanent and ending automatic citizenship for anyone born in the United States. They evince scepticism for NATO and pledge to ‘end the war on fossil fuels’, by nixing policies designed to limit climate change.

“Alongside these proposals is something that aims to revolutionise the structure of government itself. MAGA Republicans believe that they will be able to enact their programme only if they first defang the deep state by making tens of thousands of top civil servants sackable. Around 50,000 officials would be newly subject to being fired at will, under a proposed scheme known as Schedule f.

“At the same time, to fill the thousands of political appointments at the top of the American civil service, the America Firsters are creating a ‘conservative LinkedIn’ of candidates whose personal loyalty to Mr Trump is beyond question. Merely expressing qualms about the storming of the Capitol on January 6th 2021 is grounds for disqualification. None of this is a shadowy conspiracy: it is being planned in the open.

“America Firsters will argue that civil-service reform promises to enhance democracy by preventing the unelected bureaucracy from stymying the programme of an elected president. Although checks and balances are an important part of America’s constitutional design, the civil service is not one of the three branches of government it enshrines…

“If the Republicans win both houses of Congress, as is possible, nobody in the executive or the legislature will be in a position to stop Mr Trump. After all, most of those in charge will already have publicly attested to the legitimacy of storming the Capitol. The federal courts will become one of the few remaining redoubts of independence and expertise in the American system. It is hard to see how they will not also come under sustained attack.

“If these carefully laid plans were enacted, America would follow Hungary and Poland down the path of illiberal democracy. True, America has more guardrails against backsliding—including centuries of democratic history and a more raucous and more decentralised media. However, these guardrails are weaker than in the past. Moreover, many Americans would be left worse off by these plans. Trust in institutions and the rule of the law would suffer, leaving the country yet more divided.”

Ukraine? Protecting Taiwan? Trump has been anything but subtle in his disdain for that protective umbrella – he also tends to avoid or withdraw from international treaties and commitments anyway – and is an overt admirer of autocrats the world over. China and Russia are totally into election mis- and dis-information; they want Trump as President like air.

I’m Peter Dekom, for those who do not believe in this Trumpian great American unravelling, I hope they are right… otherwise stand back and stand by.