WHY TRUMP IS UNFIT TO BE RE-ELECTED PRESIDENT

 

In January 2024, the Atlantic Magazine produced a special issue entitled If Trump Wins. A bipartisan group of political scientists, journalists, and historians weighed in on what a second Trump administration would mean for the country. The special issue was published long before Biden withdrew from the campaign, before the Supreme Court increased the reach of presidential power, before Project 2025 became well known, and before many prominent Republicans and conservatives endorsed Kamala Harris for president. Nonetheless, this collection of 24 essays, which examined a number of topics and outlined the negative consequences of Donald Trump returning to the presidency, remains spot on.

For an individual in search of hard facts and reasoned opinions, this special issue of The Atlantic is insightful. This commentary will summarize some of the important findings in this landmark attempt to educate voters on why Trump is unfit to be re-elected president.

Jeffery Goldberg, Editor’s Note. “The Atlantic is deliberately not a partisan magazine. We believe that a democracy needs, among other things, a strong conservative party in order to flourish. Our concern is that the Republican Party has mortgaged itself to an antidemocratic demagogue, one who is completely devoid of decency.”

David Frum, on Autocracy.  “It has always been Trump’s supreme political wish to wield both the law and institutional violence as personal weapons of power – a wish that many in his party seem determined to help him achieve.”

Anne Appelbaum on NATO. “As president, Trump threatened to withdraw from NATO many times – including infamously at the 2018 NATO summit. But during Trump’s time in office, there was always someone there to talk him out of it. If Trump is re-elected in 2024, none of those people will be in the White House.”

McKay Coppins on Loyalists, Lapdogs, and Cronies.  “The available supply of serious qualified people willing to serve in a Trump administration has dwindled. Just four [now 24] of Trump’s 44 Cabinet secretaries have endorsed his current bid. If Trump is elected, he is expected to sign an executive order eliminating civil service protection for up to 50,000 federal workers, making them political appointees. Those fired could see their positions filled with Trump loyalists.”

Sophie Gilbert on Misogyny. “Trump’s glee in smacking down women has filtered into every aspect of our culture. But what’s more chilling about a possible second Trump presidency is that he would certainly be unchecked in his attitudes toward women. The advisors who remain with him are the ones who bolster his darker impulses.”

Zoe Schlanger on Climate Change. “A second Trump administration could do major damage. The Heritage Foundation has already made a battle-plan to block electricity-grid updates that would allow for solar and wind expansion, and to gut clean-power divisions at the Department of Energy, among other things. Under a second Trump term, the EPA would be threatened with budget cuts as it was during the first.”

Franklin Foer on Corruption. “Trump’s history suggests that he regards the government as a lucrative instrument for his own gain. It was this scenario in which the virus of foreign interests implants itself in the American government that the Founders most feared. They designed a system of government intended to forestall such efforts. But Trump has no regard for that system and every incentive to replace it with one that will line his own coffers.”

Juliette Kayyem on Extremism. “Until the very end of his presidency, Donald Trump’s cultivation of the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers, and other violent far-right groups was usually implicit. He counted on their political support but stopped short of asking them to do anything. After Nov. 3, 2020, his language became more direct. The President of the United States embraced violence as the natural extension of America’s democratic differences, and he has not stopped since.”

Megan Garber on Disinformation. “Donald Trump announced in 2018 that ‘his gut tells him more than anybody else’s brain can ever tell him.’ Facts are work. They require study; they require curiosity; they require patience; they require humility. Trump suggests he will ease the burden.  You can outsource your mind to his gut. Science lies to you. The media lies to you. Books lie to you. Courts lie to you. Other people lie to you. Democracy lies to you. The only thing you can trust, in this dizzying world, is the inveterate liar who would never lie to you.”

Clint Smith on History. “In a second term, Trump would have even more reason to promote the rewriting of the American past. The MAGA movement is already doing this in connection with Jan. 6, 2021, one of the darkest days in our country’s history. The most patriotic education is one that demands that we sit with the totality and complexity and moral inconsistencies of the American project. Trumpism seeks to censor attempts to tell this sort of story.”

Vann R. Newkirk II on Civil Rights.  “Under Trump, the Justice Department abandoned its active protection of voting rights. If Trump were to win in 2024, many of the remaining foundations of the civil rights era would be undone.”

Other essays in this special issue include science, immigration, the courts, abortion, and the way Trump induced anxiety while president. Before the most important election in our lifetime, I urge all voters to read them. https://www.theatlantic.com/if-trump-wins/