For Trump, It’s Been Promises Made, Promises Broken
In the fog of politics while the master magician plays misdirection with the facts, it is a good time to go over just what promises trump kept during his four inglorious years.
Trump never got Mexico to pay for his awful wall, he never got North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons, he played plenty of golf despite his promises to the contrary, the COVID-19 virus did not just go away one day, he did not cut taxes or the federal deficit and he definitely did not drain the swamp.
Trump had a penchant bordering on psychosis to lie and promise and lie again. He made 282 promises and kept 31, in addition to more than 30,000 documented lies, according to a study by the Washington Post. More likely than not, he knew he would not follow through on most of his guarantees, even though they sounded real good to his followers. Fact is, just like a bounced check, most of his pledges weren’t worth the paper they were written on.
As a candidate for reelection, he has not stopped making absurd promises. He has promised to end the war in Ukraine in 24 hours and now he promises to end the so-called “birthright” law that is embodied in the 14th amendment of the Constitution promising that anyone born in the U.S. is automatically a citizen. Trump couldn’t cancel the birthright law, only Congress could.
Trump is calling his campaign, “Promises Made, Promises Kept” so now is a good time to remind voters about his tawdry record and his top 30 promises made, promises broken.
1. He said the COVID-19 virus would “go away without a vaccine.” Of course, the pandemic did not wain until after the vaccine was made available. By then more than 130,00 Americans had died. He promoted the drug, hydroxychloroquine, as protection against COVID-19. He was wrong and the FDA revoked emergency authorization due to the drug’s potentially lethal side effects.
2. Trump said he would be way too busy being president to have time to play golf. Since taking office, he made a record of more than 250 golf outings, costing the taxpayers more than $136 million.
3. He said he would repeal the Affordable Care Act, known as Obamacare, and replace it with something “beautiful” because “no person should be required to buy insurance unless he or she wants to.” The individual mandate in the legislation was repealed, although the broader law was not.
4. With a straight face, trump said he’d cut taxes, and that the richest Americans, like trump, would pay more. Actually, he did the opposite and by 2027, the richest 1 percent will have received 83 percent of the Trump tax cut and the richest 0.1 percent, 60 percent of it. But more than half of all Americans will pay more in taxes. He bragged that the nation will “have the biggest tax cuts since Ronald Reagan.” The trump tax cut was nearly 0.9 percent of gross domestic product, compared with 2.89 percent of GDP for Reagan’s 1981 tax cut.
5. Putting on his blue collar clothes, trump said corporations would use their tax cuts to invest in American workers. Corporations spent more of their tax savings buying back shares of their own stock than increasing workers wages.
6. The former president said he would boost economic growth by 4 percent a year and that he would create at least 25 million jobs and “be the greatest jobs president that God ever created.” About 6.5 million jobs were created in trump’s pre-pandemic first three years. Even considering the losses since the pandemic, the nation wouldn’t have been on pace for 25 million jobs even if trump had served eight years. Excluding 2020, growth in trump’s initial three years in office was 2.5 percent, barely above the years under Obama.
7. Trump said there would be no cuts to Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid but he encouraged states to cut fraud and waste. He wanted to provide states with block grants of Medicaid funds to provide more freedom in designing programs to assist low-income citizens. That is translated into states providing fewer benefits. Social Security benefits haven’t been reduced, although trump pursued a permanent payroll tax cut that some warned could have put the entitlement in jeopardy.
8. He would be “the voice” of American workers. Rather, he was the voice of the bosses. During his administration, workers were stripped of rights, overtime protections were repealed, and workplace safety rules were rolled back.
9. Under trump, the average American family was promised a $4,000 pay raise because of his tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations. The trickle never materialized and wages for most Americans barely kept up with inflation.
10. Under trump, the federal deficit would disappear. Not exactly as the deficit has mushroomed by more than 60 percent. He promised to eliminate the $19 trillion national debt within eight years by “vigorously eliminating waste, fraud and abuse in the federal government, ending redundant government programs and growing the economy to increase tax revenues.” The debt grew to more than $26 trillion.
11. Trump promised to hire “only the best people.” At least six were so much not the “best people” that they have been charged with crimes. Trump fired a record number of his own cabinet and White House picks, and called them “whackos,” “dumb as a rock,” and “not mentally qualified.”
12. The cost of prescription drugs would fall because, trump said, drug companies are “getting away with murder.” Drug prices have soared. Trump also pushed the Food and Drug Administration to more quickly approve the thousands of drugs it was reviewing.
13. Trump insisted he would revive the struggling coal industry and bring back lost coal mining jobs. The coal industry has continued to lose jobs as clean energy becomes cheaper.
14. Though trump promised to help American workers during the pandemic, 80 percent of the tax benefits in the coronavirus stimulus package went to millionaires and billionaires. At least 21 million Americans lost extra unemployment benefits, and there were no new stimulus checks.
15. Back to that infamous border wall; trump said Mexico would pay but, as expected, Mexico laughed and the wall was estimated to cost American taxpayers around $11 billion. He also said he would “charge Mexico $100,000 for every illegal that crosses that border because it’s trouble.” He said he would triple the number of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers. The size of ICE did not increase substantially and Mexico never footed the $100,000 per immigrant bill.
Trump bragged that he would immediately deport undocumented immigrants who have committed a crime, are a member of a gang or pose a security threat. He also would deport the millions of undocumented immigrants who are in the United States on an expired visa. Trump did not deport millions but removed about 935,000 people during his four years, according to figures from the Migration Policy Institute.
16. Trump vowed to stop inner-city violence, and “make sure that when you walk down the street in your inner city, or wherever you are, you’re not going to be shot. Your child isn’t going to be shot.” Violent crime remains high in many cities.
17. He promised to end the opioid crisis. Opioid deaths have become so common that a person is more likely to die from an opioid overdose than a car accident. He also said his plan to change immigration laws would mean that “Crime will go down, border crossings will plummet, gangs will disappear and welfare use will decrease.” Gangs still exist, and violent crime is about the same level as when trump took over.
18. The trump genius would bring peace to the Middle East. There is no peace, bloodshed on both side continues despite trump’s so-called “peace plan.”
19. There were his promises to prosecute Hillary Clinton and to keep hands off of his private businesses. Clinton is a free woman and trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, made a cool $2 billion through Saudi investments.
20. He promised that on his first day in office, he would end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, known as DACA. The Supreme Court ruled that his plan to deport 700,000 young immigrants was unconstitutional. Trump did halt DACA, but not until September 2017.
21. Trump promised “six weeks of paid maternity leave to any mother with a newborn child whose employer does not provide the benefit.” Those new moms are still waiting for the six weeks of paid maternity leave.
22. Trump said he’d force companies to keep jobs in America, and that there would be consequences for companies that shipped jobs abroad. Trump with great self-generated fanfare called executives at the parent company of Carrier, an air-conditioning manufacturer that was closing a plant in Indiana and moving to Mexico. He threatened to impose a 35 percent tariff on air conditioners imported into the United States. A deal was struck before trump took office, preserving 800 jobs in Indiana and leading Trump to hail the announcement as a sign of things to come.
Since then, many businesses have moved production out of Indiana and overseas. Other companies like GE, Carrier, Ford, and Harley Davidson have continued to outsource thousands of jobs while still receiving massive tax breaks.
23. Trump promised to shred the Iran nuclear deal and renegotiate a better agreement. Trump failed to negotiate a new deal and Iran has continued to work toward developing nuclear weapons.
24. He promised that China would pay for tariffs on imported goods. Trump’s trade war cost U.S. consumers $34 billion a year, eliminated 300,000 American jobs, and cost American taxpayers $22 billion in subsidies for farmers hurt by the tariffs.
25. Trump walked away from the Paris Climate Accord and promised to negotiate a better deal on the environment. Instead, environmental laws have been stripped to the bone.
He said he would kill the Clean Power Plan, which reduces the amount of carbon pollution from power plants. Trump claimed his plan could save the country $7.2 billion per year but a federal appeals court struck down his Clean Power Plan replacement.
He also said he would eliminate the Clean Water Rule that defines the “waters of the United States” and gives added protection to tributaries that impact the health of downstream waters. Trump rolled back large portions of the rule but didn’t eliminate it entirely.
26. Trump vowed to strengthen the military so that it’s “so big and so strong and so great” that “nobody’s going to mess with us.” He expanded military funding, and there were no attacks on the U.S. just like there were no attacks in previous presidencies. The former president said he would boost the Army from 470,000 active-duty soldiers to 540,000. As of September, 2020, it stood at about 481,000.
27. He promised to double the nation’s growth by at least 4 percent a year. Excluding 2020, growth in Trump’s initial three years in office was 2.5 percent. That was narrowly above that of the years under President Obama.
28. He promised to spend $1 trillion in public and private funds on infrastructure projects over 10 years in “transportation, clean water, a modern and reliable electricity grid, telecommunications, security infrastructure and other pressing domestic infrastructure needs.” There was no significant infrastructure legislation was passed on Trump’s watch.
29. Trump promised to remain “the healthiest individual ever elected to the presidency.” Apparently, his excess weight and his unexplained visit to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in late 2019 didn’t count
30. As president, trump insisted that he would force other NATO countries to pay for more of their defense, and only come to the aid of other countries if those nations have “fulfilled their obligations to us.” Defense News reported, “Under NATO commitments forged 2014 — two years before Trump took office, and coinciding with Russia’s annexation of Crimea — each ally has until 2024 to reach their goal to spend 2 percent of its gross domestic product on its own defense.”