Opinion
Donald Trump is the 2024 Republican nominee for president. Why do people plan to vote for Donald Trump? Do Trump supporters have a legitimate reason to vote for the former New York real estate developer? Which policies has he proposed that will improve America? And finally, how will he inspire unity in a divided country?
Donald Trump’s rhetoric
Let’s begin with Trump’s rhetoric.
According to some extremism experts, Trump has used reckless and divisive language as president to appeal to his voters. For example, a BBC article noted he described COVID-19 as the “Kung Flu.” This sentiment, among others, shows how Trump used his platform to cast blame on Asian Americans for causing the spread of the coronavirus in America. It was widely reported that this had a huge impact on the Asian American community, as it led to an alarming rate of racism and violence.
Furthermore, Trump said that immigrants are coming for “black jobs” at the National Association of Black Journalists in Chicago in August.
What is a “black job?”
This rhetoric pits immigrants and black people against each other. His reference to “black jobs” provoked widespread mockery on social media according to Northwestern News. The term makes it seem like specific jobs are for different people based on their identities.
In reality, and according to the law, that is not the case. In America, all jobs are open any citizen with the best qualifications, regardless of your racial, ethnic, or sexual identity.
Sam Jardine, a college student who is a conservative, participated in the Republican Voters Against Trump after Trump refused to accept defeat in the 2020 presidential election and initiating unprecedented violence on Jan. 6, 2021, at the Capitol.
Does Trump help the narrative around Black Lives Matter?
No, former President Donald Trump has never endorsed the “Black Lives Matter” slogan, instead, he has supported law enforcement and created a sense of opposition between protesters of BLM and law enforcement.
An article from Politico states how protesters chanted the phrase, “Pigs in a Blanket, Fry ‘Em Like Bacon,” which refers to killing police, according to Trump in a tweet, but that is not the case. No protesters used the chant following George Floyd’s death in 2020. The chant was used in 2015 in a Minnesota demonstration.
Trump White House press secretary, Kayleigh McEnany, cited the “pigs in a blanket” slogan is his rationale for opposing the Black Lives Matter movement. This means that he has no sense of policy to help the narrative in race relations when it comes to white and black people because he lacks the empathy to understand why we are protesting and rioting still to this day. Martin Luther King Jr. said that a riot is the language of the unheard.
An article from OpenDemocracy wants an explanation of how former President Trump or the Republican party are responsible for these problems that relate to Black Lives Matter.
No, they are not responsible, but they do not help the narrative by not explaining why the movement is occurring and reiterating messages of how to help the narrative.
Is the reason why they didn’t endorse Black Lives Matter because of their values?
Republicans are conservative so I could understand why they would oppose defunding the police. This idea brings up a very crucial point in the aforementioned article, which explains the root of the problem is linked to poverty, the war on drugs and criminal justice. This should be the focus of the national media.
Donald Trump’s view of women
Next, Trump does not support Roe v. Wade. He is the reason why the Supreme Court is more conservative than ever as he appointed conservative judges: Amy Coney Barret, Brett Kanavaugh and Neil Gorsuch, according to NYSBA and NBC News.
Don’t all women deserve the right to have an abortion? It’s their body and they should have the freedom to do whatever they want with it.
DNC Chair Jaime Harrison describes him as a anti-choice extremist who is determined to take away the rights of women. Trump would go on to say “whether the women like it or not, I’m going to protect them,” at a campaign rally in Wisconsin. He does not understand a woman’s agency and it is very ignorant for him to say that he didn’t play a key role in taking away women’s right to an abortion.
Trump asked the crowd, “is there any woman in this giant stadium who would like not to be protected? Is there any woman in this stadium that wants to be protected by the president?” He is trying to appeal to his female audience while stroking his ego even when he is not president. This verbiage and his actions as president is the reason why the gender gap is widening among voters. 56% of registered voters are saying that Trump pays too little attention to women’s concerns.
Has Trump helped the economy?
Sam Jardine wrote about the reasons why he voted for Trump in 2020, noting that he shared the same values as the GOP that includes the sanctity of life, low taxes and a business-friendly regulatory climate. Jardine wrote he admired Trump in his first term, despite Trump’s personal conduct, so he would “ignore the tweets.” An article from the Washington Post describes 10 ways Trump built a business-friendly environment, including:
- His “Buy American, Hire American” order gave priority to U.S. companies that hire non-immigrants and make goods domestically
- Reversed a ban on arctic leasing and opened up oil and gas drilling opportunities for energy companies
- The “Promoting Free Speech and Religious Liberty” directive allows some to not comply with the Affordable Care Act
- “Directed the Environment Protection Agency to review former President Obama’s Clean Power Plan with the eye of reducing the regulatory burden on the oil, natural gas, coal and nuclear energy industries”
- Signed an order that directed agencies and departments to cut two regulations for every one created and to offset new spending caused by regulations with an equal decrease in costs
- Ordered every agency to have a Regulatory Reform Officer review and make recommendation for modifying regulations
His supporters believe he is a good businessman. At a rally in Wisconsin, he told them that “We had the greatest economy in the world.” Two sources, the Associated Press and Joint Economic Committee, refute that concept.
Josh Boak from the AP writes growth after inflation and tax cuts dropped to 1.45% compared to Obama’s growth at 2.33% and Biden’s 3.4%. Trump’s tax cuts disproportionately benefited wealthy corporations. He never fulfilled his promise on deficit reduction that rose to $3.1 trillion.
The Congressional Budget Office estimated in a report the extension of parts of Trump’s tax cuts set to expire after 2025 would add another $4.6 trillion to the national debt through the year 2034. The Joint Economic Committee states his 2017 tax cuts gave individuals more money to spend, maybe that’s why people support Trump? However, economists have called it a “sugar high” that will have a negative impact of $1.9 trillion in new federal debt.
Inflation was low during Trump’s presidency due to the pandemic’s weakening of the economy, as gasoline prices decreased and mortgage rates were low too. He added 6.7 million jobs in comparison to Biden’s 15.4 million. This is 5.1 million more jobs than what the CBO forecasted he would add before the COVID-19 relief package and other policies became law.
Furthermore, the Joint Economic Committee stated Trump initiated a trade war with China by accusing them of killing 100,000 Americans a year with imported fentanyl and hundred billions of dollars in intellectual property. His priority is to decrease the trade deficit with China, which economists and trade experts say is irrelevant because a larger trade deficit indicates a stronger economy, according to Backgrounder.
Trump says the trade deficit hurts the economy and blames horrible deals with foreign countries like Mexico, South Korea and other countries. Cheap foreign imports put American factories out of operation and “destroyed jobs” in combination to threatening national security. One of the most direct ways to reduce the trade deficit is to reduce the government budget deficit which is impossible because of Trump’s proposals for higher security, stimulus spending and his 2017 tax cuts.
Trump’s trade war hurts the economy as more and more Americans are losing jobs according to the Joint Economic Committee.
In other words, no, Donald Trump did not help the economy.
The executive director of the nonpartisan Women & Politics Institute, Ms. Fischer Martin, said, “If he were to say something like: ‘You may not like me personally, you may not like my rhetoric, but if you want to worry less about grocery bills . . . I’m your guy,” according to the New York Times.
Trump wants to impose a tariff on goods up to 20% coming into the U.S. and a 60% tariff on goods from China in relation to the trade war. Some experts this will not bring down the cost of groceries, but will instead boost inflation.
So are Trump voters only focusing only on how he will help the economy? Is that the only quality a president needs to be successful?
What qualities do you think a president needs in order to be a successful one and run the country efficiently?
What are Donald Trump’s other policies?
It has been a decade and Trump’s healthcare plan is still in the “concept” phase, according Mother Jones. This was even talked about during the recent Harris-Trump debate in September.
Obamacare has positives and negatives like every healthcare plan. The positive aspects include how affordable it is for most Americans and the coverage for preexisting health conditions, while the negatives include many people having to pay higher premiums.
It has been difficult for voters to articulate Trump’s policies on healthcare, mainly because he hasn’t provided details about how he plans to replace Obamacare.
Why would I vote for someone who lacks a healthcare replacement plan policy?
Trump takes the “tough guy” approach which makes him more capable of fighting actions required to keep the world order under U.S. control, according to The Telegraph. The article critiqued President Joe Biden in how he handled foreign relations between Israel and Palestine. Biden has changed his position to appease both nations. He is careful about supporting Jerusalem. He has pandered to left-wing Democrats and progressives by softening his support of Israel. This makes him look weak and his foreign policy ratings have declined, according to Mark Penn, former Bill Clinton campaign adviser and now highly-esteemed pollster.
John Massoud of The Northern Virginia Daily said Trump forged peace in the Middle East between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan. He also took out Iranian terrorist mastermind Qasem Soleimani without the approval of Congress. Iranian officials have called that an act of war that will be met with severe retaliation.
He launched military strikes two times against Syria for using chemical weapons against civilians. He didn’t articulate a legal rationale for those actions. Syria, Russia, Iran and Bolivia opposed the airstrikes. These airstrikes make the foreign relationships with these countries weaker. Is that what we want? Do Americans want a leader who doesn’t rationalize with his peers about his actions?
His policy of peace through strength produced three Arab-Israeli peace accords.
These pieces of evidence tell me that Trump just does what he wants. He ignores the opinions of others which rubs people the wrong way. We deserve foreign policies that are agreed upon by every level of the federal government so we have no mentions of threats from other countries.
Conclusion
With Donald Trump, it all depends on what you value in life. Do you value public safety? How about money? His policies align better with these values according to Josh Fleming, a small business owner who voted for Trump in 2016 and 2020.
Do you factor in character when voting for any leader of an institution? Or, does his appeal matter more? These questions are very crucial because his leadership style has created division in this melting pot of people from different backgrounds that has led to violence. Harris even asked Trump during their debate in September, “Why do you keep using race as a divisive tool?”
He uses race as a tactic to appeal to his voters in his performance.
Yes, performance. What Trump says and does is performative. He wants to paint a narrative about himself to identify with those who share the same sentiments on issues like race that other people do because they look like him. The majority of America is still white.
Although, many black celebrities have endorsed Trump, like Amber Rose, Kanye West, Lil Wayne and LeVeon Bell.
For example, Amber Rose said that she supports Trump because his supporters “… don’t care if you’re straight, gay, black, or white, it’s all love.” I would agree with this if it wasn’t for Trump’s rhetoric like when he talks about “black jobs” and calls the coronavirus the “Kung Flu.”
Do Americans support Donald Trump based on their values? I value character over material wealth like money, or popularity. Trump shows he has weak moral character. As a leader, why would you make inappropriate jokes about a deadly disease that has killed countless people? When people like me needed our president to speak positively on the Black Lives Matter movement to garner more support from people who listen to him, he didn’t. What does that say about what he thinks about minorities?
Northwestern Psychology Professor Dan P. McAdams may have said it best: “Trump will be all about winning now and very little about what happens next.”
Editor’s note: The second to last paragraph has been edited since its original publication.
Featured image: Photo by Gage Skidmore via Flickr CC BY-SA 2.0
Edited by Allison Clair & James Sutton
