Donald Trump spent much of the last two years promising that catastrophe would befall the nation if he were to lose the presidential election: World War III. An economic “blood bath.” America practically ceasing to exist.
He opened his second term with the inverse promise that a “golden age” — one that only he can deliver — has begun simply by virtue of his return.
In his 29-minute Inaugural Address, Trump promised to defeat inflation and to “end the chronic disease epidemic.” He promised national power so great that it could “stop all wars,” and expand the nation’s territory. He even promised to “restore American promise.”
He did not actually promise the moon. But he did promise to plant an American flag on Mars.
It was a speech by a lifelong marketer who has long seen sweeping promises as his political bread and butter, well aware of their power to fire up his base whether or not he fulfilled them — and well aware that his supporters don’t always expect him to. His first-term promise to build a wall paid for by Mexico, for example, defined him politically and changed the terms of the nation’s immigration debate, even though it never came to pass.
“After all we have been through together,” he said on Monday, “we stand on the verge of the four greatest years in American history.”
Trump is a man who has been running for president almost constantly since 2015. And in a way, his pledge-filled speech on Monday made him sound a lot like a candidate still trying to run up the score. He accused the Biden administration of defending foreign nations and failing to manage crises at home, while his die-hard supporters watched from a downtown Washington arena set up exactly like a campaign rally.
Many of his promises seemed aimed directly at them. Trump said he would make it official government policy that there are only two genders. He would reinstate service members expelled from the military over Covid mandates, and with back pay. Later in the day, he suggested that pardons for prisoners convicted of crimes for their actions on Jan. 6, 2021, were imminent.
Trump’s entreaties to voters beyond his base were vaguer. He thanked Black and Hispanic voters for helping him “set records,” but he did not promise them anything specific. He did not say how he would help Los Angeles residents who have lost everything in wildfires, though he falsely claimed that the fires had been allowed to rage without even “a token of defense.”
And some of his promises were about things that are so subject to interpretation that he’ll be able to declare them kept whenever he chooses to. He promised to “bring back free speech to America,” and to make the United States “a rich nation again,” even though it already is one.
He will now begin to turn his words into action. He signed a blitz of executive orders on Monday that aim to crack down on immigration and dismantle government diversity programs, among a raft of other things. In Tijuana, migrants reported shock and confusion as existing appointments at border points of entry were suddenly canceled.
He held off enacting other promises, though. He has long pledged that steep tariffs would be a centerpiece of his industrial policy, but he stopped short on enacting them today.
But to Trump, decline is over when he says it is. The golden age is here because he is president. If he’s happy, everyone’s happy. The promise itself is the point.
… and a few thoughts on the first lady’s hat.
Inaugural ceremonies usually put the first family on view as the new face of a nation.
But Melania Trump made sure hers was difficult to see.
Her broad-brimmed hat shaded her eyes and gave her an air of inaccessibility that’s unusual for an inauguration, our fashion critic Vanessa Friedman wrote.
“It was, however, in line with the guarded image Mrs. Trump has cultivated since her husband emerged on the political scene,” Vanessa wrote. “Not to mention the promise of an imperial presidency that President Trump has dangled.”
