December 26, 2024 - 5:30pm
Conservatives may control the three branches of Government, but Donald Trump’s majorities in both the House and Senate could pose major problems for the President-elect.
Because of the unusual combination of the Constitution’s term limits and Trump’s non-consecutive tenure in the office, the President-elect is entering the White House as a lame duck. And, as last week’s debt fiasco shows, the truth of this is being made plain even before he settles into the Oval Office.
It’s a fact of American political life that a president in his second term lacks the sway of one just entering office. But every time this has happened before, it has concerned a president who was already in office, who already had his people in place from the first term and could hit the ground running in the second. (The only other non-consecutive presidency, Grover Cleveland’s, predated formal term limits, but even he struggled in the last two years.)
Trump, on the other hand, will be putting his staff and his agenda in place at the same time that the big political players are already looking past him to 2028. Trump will certainly impact the midterm elections in ways we cannot yet guess, but 5 November 2024 was the last time any member of Congress will appear on the ballot with him. This is already the most influential Trump will ever be, and his power will decline with each passing day.
Trump’s plan for the coming years is still unknown, but it will certainly involve some of his signature issues. On immigration, he enjoys the support of the American people in poll after poll, and will probably have little trouble in getting Congress to go along with building more sections of the wall or increasing funding for more border patrol agents. Maintaining the tax cuts of his first term should also prove popular.
On other issues, like the introduction of higher tariffs and the reduction of government spending, he faces a more uphill battle. Even where tariffs might be broadly popular among his supporters, each individual rate hike will challenge the financial position of a vested interest. Will a lame-duck president be able to sway members of congress to alienate those friends in industry that promise support for years to come?
Likewise, each cut to the bureaucracy endangers a programme that some representative or senator holds dear. Shallow but widespread support for change often fails against narrow but deep efforts to keep things the same. While some moderate Democrats might be inclined to support tariffs or border security, to reduce the size of government Trump will have to rely upon his own party.
Trump comes to office now, as he did in 2016, as the leader of a triumphant populist movement. But nothing lasts forever. For Trump to see his vision written into law, he must act quickly, before the gravity of term limits drags him back to earth.
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SubscribeNo-one realizes this with more clarity than Trump. He will hit the ground running.
I’d like to agree with you, but discipline and organization are not Trump’s strengths.
Maybe, but part of the problem in his first term were the efforts by Democrats and the deep state (one andthe same) to force him from office.
He will act (or should act) as if the US has a one term system and just get on with it.
Trump leads a coalition that oncludes rfk junior ( make america healthy again), evangelicals, free speech people ( elon musk), bitcoiners , non college grads in general. Its a broad coalition that really has the wind in their sails after the implosion of the dems who appear treasonous at times. As domeone who supported rfk , was happy to see trump win but i can see that he is flawed also although i admire is courage. I rely more on the coalition holding together and my wish is just restoring decent , normal politics ( free speech, sensible immigration). Would love to see the mefical system shaken up by rfk ( with childhood vax cine schedule, “aids pandemic” as well as advertising all scrutinised closely. Let ” the truth come dropping slow lest all me go blind” as dickenson wrote. Anyway suffice it to say I hope for tje best from this coalition through to 2028 and beyond. It is not reluant on one individual.
At the very least Trump must reform the education system, which has been in steep decline for at least thirty years. The richest country in the world is not even in the top twenty according to most metrics.
Abolishing the centralised Department of Education and returning power to teachers and parents is the first step. He must also end government subsidy of universities, especially those that have become more concerned with indoctrination than education.
He will have to get through in 24 hours what he would have planned to do in 48 hours if he was seeking re-election in 2028.
I’ve never understood why countries impose term limits on leaders. If a leader is doing a good job and enjoys the support of a majority then why force them from office to be replaced by somebody inferior or less popular?
All politicians/parties eventually upset too many people and become unable to lead so why not let it occur naturally when the populace wants it to?
(This isn’t to say I support/oppose anybody in particular in the States, if I lived there I’d have been rather annoyed about the fact the richest and most powerful country on earth was forced to pick between two utterly useless candidates as Trump or Harris. It was more a general observation)
The thought behind term limits is that too many voters will vote for the incumbent even if the challenger would be better. It’s hard to have a fair election when one person is campaigning with the power that political office gives them.
It’s like a monopolist company in the economy that cannot help but abuse its monopoly power against its competitors. Like term limits turn a powerful incumbent out of office regardless of their popularity, many economists think that companies that are dominant in their markets have to be broken up whether anticompetitive conduct can be proven or not.
You give the example of Donald Trump and Kamala Harris as being poor candidates, but both were much better than Joe Biden. He used the power of incumbency to win the nomination of his party and come very close to winning another term even though he was utterly incompetent in his office.
Joe Biden is as good an example of the power of incumbency as Franklin Roosevelt, the original impetus for term limits on the president. He should never have been elected to a fourth term as he was in such poor health that he died not even three months into it. Better he not be allowed to run.
Still, you are right that voters do tire of politicians after a while. Even without term limits for presidents, only three presidents before Franklin Roosevelt tried for a third term, and they lost. But at least term limits will keep Donald Trump from running for a third term, which at his age, regardless of his politics, would be very unwelcome.
Still seems daft to me. The reason Biden was running again was because it was felt he was their best chance of winning. Once it became clear he had no hope he was ditched for Harris, whose weak campaign showed why they tried to play down Bidens old age in the first place. Term limits had nothing to do with that election. Likewise it’s much harder to conceal cognitive decline or failing health now than it was 100 years ago thanks to television and the internet, as Biden proved. Perhaps there’s now an argument to do away with term limits and leave the decision entirely to the electorate. If in 4 years voters can see Trump physically and mentally failing he wouldn’t be elected anyway
London has an issue with the absence of term-limits and its current Mayor Khan. It’s vital to stay protected from those who have the time and patience to “boil the frog slowly”. By the time the younger generation gets old/wise enough to realise what has been going on, it may be too late to reverse the damage.
If the people of London want Khan to continue as Mayor then that’s their choice. It’s certainly not one I’d make but I’m a democrat so I believe they should be able to choose who they like
I agree completely. It’s just a huge shame the voters are so bl**dy naive.
The problem is the “people of London” have been replaced with “friends of Khan” who just vote for him regardless of what he does as long as it favours his religious friends.
In the US it’s a trade-off. Some might be good as you suggest. Others are parked for life in safe districts as long as they toe the party line and don’t cause trouble. What I would like to see them do is their jobs. In the past 40 years, the US Congress has passed a budget on time for the new fiscal year only four times – the last time was in 1996. The old guys in Congress think this is normal behavior. I would like to see Congressed forced to pass a budget on time. If they don’t do it by the time the new fiscal year starts, they should be sequestered in a gymnasium and fed military MRE rations until they pass a budget. If they cannot do it in 30 days, that Congress should be disbanded, and a new one put into place in a rapid election. Extreme perhaps, but for crying out loud, do your job – if you can’t then go home.
Ironically it was Republicans who supported term limits in 1930’s to curb the power of FDR.
Worth reading the history on the 22nd amendment. The first President also set an example. US tradition v much against an elective Monarchy.
Penny beginning to drop. Good grief it’s taken a while, but eventually more and more will painfully get there.
Republicans have majority of two in the House, and just by way of one example – in order to spend big to deliver his promise of c11million returned ‘illegals’ he’s got to commit some serious money. How’s he raising it? House already blocked increase in debt ceiling? Tax cuts – hmm how’s he funding those when in fact he’s looking to spend more? More debt? Or cuts to programmes he never indicated? DOGE won’t find billions without changes to entitlements and will quickly run into severe criticism for corruption in having vested interests. Even Trump doesn’t think it’ll save that much as he gave DOGE 18mths to produce a report!
(Slight aside – it’d be cheaper and more effective to hit employers harder for employing illegals. Remove the ability to work and many will return home and pay for it themselves. Plus Trump would avoid the pictures of Mum’s and kids crying in holding centres – although perhaps some of the MAGA want that pleasure?)
Tariffs as an ‘income raiser’ – well as Author states they’ll be plenty against those moving much beyond what Biden sustained. Trade war will clobber the US economy, which in fact is doing pretty well right now. Elon may want to extract some competitive advantage of course but they’ll be plenty of the Kleptocracy quietly looking to weaken him too. We’re at ‘peak’ Musk and it won’t last.
One thing thus is a cert – growing awareness promises getting broken whilst the Billionaire friends seem to be content. That’ll spew deflection and search for scapegoats.
It’s also quite interesting when you look at the House seats up in 2026. Not a good mix for Trump. The tiny majority he has is going to disappear.
Now can he hit the ground running given the advantage of 2 months lead in and make the most of the tailwind he should have for a while following his victory? His range of picks for office suggest chaos will consume as much time as ever. There is no strategy. It’s the same old transactional what side of the bed did I get of today.
It’s interesting the analysis did not discuss the power of the 33 senators who won’t face voters until two full years after the President-elect leaves office. Those legislators can essentially tell the White House to pound sand if they want.
“Shallow but widespread support for change often fails against narrow but deep efforts to keep things the same.”
Perceptive.
Yeppers. The reality is that a counter-revolution by the reactionaries against Trump could well succeed.