Trump: A Year in the White House

January 18, 2018

According to a National Public Radio interview held with the 45th President of the United States, when Donald Trump won the presidential election a year ago, he promised “with the exception of the late, great Abraham Lincoln, I can be more presidential than any president that’s ever held this office.”

He has forced Washington to adjust to him — accelerating the pace, raising the temperature and widening the fractures in both parties, according to an article written by USA Today Washington Bureau chief, Susan Page.

According to Page, he [Trump] has redefined the GOP in his image — no longer the party of free trade, global leadership and deficit reduction but of “America First.”

Since inauguration, while the Trump administration hasn’t accomplished more than past administrations in the first 90 days, it has delivered on some campaign promises, according to Politifact, a fact-checking website that rates the accuracy of claims by elected officials and others who speak up in American politics,

One of Trump’s most significant achievements so far has been the nomination and confirmation of Neil Gorsuch as a justice on the Supreme Court.

Gorsuch was an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States who Trump nominated to succeed Antonin Scalia, following an almost year-long vacancy after Scalia’s death, according to oyez.org, a website that provides information on past and present Supreme Court Cases, Supreme Court Justices and opinions, and the Judicial Branch itself.

About a month into his presidency, Trump also nullified the Obama-era gun control order that required the Social Security Administration to share records of individuals who get Disability Insurance benefits, information that would eventually show up on their background checks when they sought to buy guns.

According to Politifact, the Trump administration said it was getting rid of that rule because it “could endanger the Second Amendment rights of law abiding citizens.”

Trump also made good on a campaign promise to place a lifetime ban on White House officials lobbying for foreign governments.

The ban was for executive branch appointees but includes a provision that would allow the president or a designee to waive the restriction.

Through an executive order, Trump pushed forward one of his signature immigration promises: a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.

According to Politifact, it’s still to be determined if Congress will grant Trump $999 million for the planning, design and construction of the first installment of the wall (his supplemental budget request for fiscal year 2017), or the $2.6 billion requested for fiscal 2018, which would cover costs for the wall and other border security.

Another big step towards policy change by the Trump administration is the new Tax Reform Plan.

According to investopedia.com, the largest financial education website in the world, on November 16, the House of Representatives passed its version of the “Tax Cuts and Jobs Act” by a vote of 227 to 205.

That same day, the Senate Finance Committee approved its version, according to investopedia.com.

On November 21, the Senate Budget Committee also passed the bill, allowing the full Senate to vote on the modified bill by December 1.

Both plans are based on the Trump administration’s plan presented on September 27, 2017.

According to thebalance.com, a website run by financial experts that offer financial advice, both plans cut income tax rates, double the standard deduction, and eliminate personal exemptions.

The Senate plan may only cut the rate to 22 % to fund other cuts.

With these new plans, the Senate plan would help businesses more than individuals, according to thebalance.com.

Through 2027, business taxes would be lower overall, but individual taxes at every income level would increase by 2027.

Among individuals, it would help higher income families the most- everyone gets a tax cut in 2019, but in 2021, taxes will increase on those making $30,000 or less.

The Tax Policy Center found that taxpayers earning in the top 1% would receive a larger percent tax cut than those in lower income levels- by 2027, those in the lowest 20 % would pay higher taxes.

The Tax Policy Center also estimated the House bill would impose higher taxes on 31 % of middle-class households in 2027.

Neither plan helps the lowest-income families, according to New York University law professor Lily Batchelder in an interview with the daily magazine Slate, a general-interest publication offering analysis and commentary about politics, news, business, technology, and culture.

That’s because more than 70 million Americans don’t make enough to pay taxes, and the plans also don’t help the third of taxpayers who have incomes that fall below current standard deduction and personal exemptions, according to Batchelder.

On an international scale, Trump has not backed away from his promise to get NATO allies to increase their defense spending.

He’s highlighted this issue in meetings with Jens Stoltenberg, the NATO secretary general and with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, according to Politifact.

According to USA Today, Trump continues to be as unpredictable as he was during his 2016 Presidential campaign.

According to USA Today, He has forced Washington to adjust to him — accelerating the pace, raising the temperature and widening the fractures in both parties.

“Trump’s successors can draw lessons from his successful and lasting appeal to the white working class, his flamboyant verbal disparagement of establishment Washington, his attempt to diminish a hostile mainstream media and his strong use of executive powers,” said political scientist Steven Schier, co-author of The Trump Presidency: An Outsider in the Oval Office in an interview with USA Today.

“All this has converted the presidency into an engine of battle. Future presidents will no doubt fire up that engine for their own purposes.”

According to William Inboden, who teaches at the LBJ School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas in an interview with the National Public Radio, as the legislator in chief, Trump has “departed from past presidential tradition, subcontracting his agenda to his party leaders in Congress.”

Perhaps as a result of his indifference to the details of policy as Trump has yet to sign into law a single piece of significant legislation, according to Inboden.

As President, Trump has broken norms and astounded the American population, and it’s only natural that as we come into 2018, we wonder just what he will come up with in his second year in office.