Plenty of boasting, yet Trump short on substance

In Donald Trump’s address to the joint session of congress on Wednesday AEDT, Americans got what they voted for. The President presented a grab bag of promises to support his message that “our spirit is back, our pride is back, our confidence is back, and the American dream is surging bigger and better than ever before”. It was a victor’s speech and the chants of “USA! USA!” started as the President began, drowning out the heckling of Democrat Al Green, who continued until Speaker Mike Johnson had him removed from the chamber. Others walked out.

Mr Trump could not have asked for anything more, demonstrating to his supporters that he was working in the national interest while his opponents had nothing to offer. The President spoke at great length of what he had done and what he would do soon on illegal immigration and government waste, on making English the official national language and stopping federal funding for trans players in women’s sport. “Our country will be woke no longer,” he proclaimed. “The days of rule by unelected bureaucrats are over.”

Leading with culture-war claims added to the feel of a candidate’s stump speech; it set the tone for his announcements on major policy issues. On inflation, Mr Trump would “make America affordable again”. He would balance the budget while cutting taxes “for everybody”. He would expand manufacturing by imposing tariffs, “which will make America rich again”. “We have been ripped off by every country on Earth and we will not let that happen any more,” he said. He renewed his idea of a national missile defence system similar to Israel’s Iron Dome writ enormously large.

For patriots he promised the US flag would be planted on Mars. There was more, much more, of the same and while Mr Trump’s rhetoric was outlandish his intent was no different to presidents before him who have used the bully pulpit of an address to congress to conflate politics with policy. He is far from the first president to have talked a gigantic game without any apparent idea of how to pay for it.

Mr Trump also has the political means to attempt to do much of what he wants. The Republican Party has majorities in the Senate and House of Representatives, and there is a Republican-friendly majority on the US Supreme Court. Mr Trump has governed by executive order from the start of his second term, apparently on the assumption that no one in the other arms of government will oppose him or that they will fail if they try. This is exactly what the US founding fathers designed the constitution to prevent. But on what we have seen to date there is nothing to stop Mr Trump from governing as he likes, at least until the 2027 midterm elections, when the Democrats might – might – claw back a majority in the House of Representatives.

The President’s speech demonstrates other advantages he has in governing for the news cycle rather than the state of the nation after he leaves office. He is happy to try anything that may deliver a win. Sometimes it works. Certainly he failed in his first term to do a deal on nuclear disarmament with North Korea. However, his administration succeeded with the Abraham Accords between Israel and Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates, which is still a model for more agreements between Israel and other Middle East nations.

There is much less to be said for his ignorance, unless it is indifference, to the US’s 80-year role as the champion of democracies. He talked up the prospects of peace between Russia and Ukraine, stating that Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky – whom Mr Trump bullied by cutting off munitions – now wanted to negotiate and was ready to sign a deal. Mr Trump summed up his pitch when he said there was a “commonsense revolution that is now, because of us, sweeping the entire world”. Governing the US is way more complicated than that, however. But what the American people saw on Wednesday from Mr Trump is what they will get for four more years.