Trump 2.0: Sweeping Changes Planned for a Second Term | 12 Big Promises

Washington: Donald Trump has pledged sweeping changes if he serves a second term as president.

former president, w president-elect, often skips details, but over more than a year of speeches and statements has outlined a bro nda. His plans mix tritional conservative stances on taxes, regulations, and cultural issues with a more populist view on tre and a redefined U.S. role globally.

Trump’s nda includes scaling back federal civil rights efforts and expanding presidential powers.

A look at Trump’s proposals:

Immigration

“Build wall!” from his 2016 campaign has become creating “ largest mass deportation program in history.” Trump has called for using National Guard and empowering domestic police forces in effort. 

Still, Trump has been scant on details of what program would look like and how he would ensure that it targeted only people in U.S. illegally. 

He’s pitched “ideological screening” for would-be entrants, ending birth-right citizenship (which almost certainly would require a constitutional change), and said he’d reinstitute first-term policies such as “Remain in Mexico,” limiting migrants on public health grounds and severely limiting or banning entrants from certain majority-Muslim nations. 

Altoger, approach would t just crack down on illegal migration, but curtail immigration overall.

Abortion

Trump played down abortion as a second-term priority, even as he took credit for Supreme Court ending a woman’s federal right to terminate a pregnancy and returning abortion regulation to state governments. 

At Trump’s insistence, GOP platform, for first time in deces, did t call for a national ban on abortion. Trump maintains that overturning Roe v. We is eugh on federal level.

Still, Trump has t said explicitly that he would veto national abortion restrictions if y reached his desk. 

And in an example of how conservative movement might proceed with or without Trump, anti-abortion activists te that GOP platform still asserts that a fetus should have due process protections under 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause. 

That constitutional argument is a romap for conservatives to seek a national abortion ban through federal courts.

Taxes

Trump’s tax policies broly tilt toward corporations and wealthier Americans. That’s mostly due to his promise to extend his 2017 tax overhaul, with a few table changes that include lowering corporate income tax rate to 15% from current 21%. 

That also involves rolling back Democratic President Joe Biden ’s income tax hikes on wealthiest Americans and scrapping Inflation Reduction Act levies that finance energy measures intended to combat climate change.

Those policies twithstanding, Trump has put more emphasis on new proposals aimed at working- and middle class Americans: exempting earned tips, Social Security ws and overtime ws from income taxes.

It’s teworthy, however, that his proposal on tips, depending on how Congress might write it, could give a back-door tax break to top w earners by allowing m to reclassify some of ir pay as tip income — a prospect that at its most extreme could see hedge-fund manrs or top-flight attorneys taking vant of a policy that Trump frames as being designed for restaurant servers, bartenders and or service workers.

Tariffs and Tre

Trump’s posture on international tre is to distrust world markets as harmful to American interests. He proposes tariffs of 10% to 20% on foreign goods — and in some speeches has mentioned even higher percents. 

He promises to reinstitute an August 2020 executive order requiring that Food and Drug ministration buy “essential” medications only from U.S. companies. He pledges to block purchases of “any vital infrastructure” in U.S. by Chinese buyers.

DEI, LGBTQ, and Civil Rights

Trump has called for rolling back societal emphasis on diversity and for legal protections for LGBTQ citizens. Trump has called for ending diversity, equity and inclusion programs in government institutions, using federal funding as lever.

On trans rights, Trump promises generally to end “boys in girls’ sports,” a practice he insists, without evidence, is widespre. But his policies go well beyond standard applause lines from his rally speeches. 

Among or ideas, Trump would roll back Biden ministration’s policy of extending Title IX civil rights protections to trans students, and he would ask Congress to require that only two s can be recognized at birth.

Regulation, Federal Bureaucracy, and Presidential Power

president-elect seeks to reduce role of federal bureaucrats and regulations across ecomic sectors. Trump frames all regulatory cuts as an ecomic magic wand. 

He pledges precipitous drops in U.S. households’ utility bills by removing obstacles to fossil fuel production, including opening all federal lands for exploration — even though U.S. energy production is alrey at record highs. 

Trump promises to unleash housing construction by cutting regulations — though most construction rules come from state and local government. He also says he would end “frivolous litigation from environmental extremists.”

approach would in many ways strengn executive branch influence. That power would come more directly from White House.

He would make it easier to fire federal workers by classifying thousands of m as being outside civil service protections. That could weaken government’s power to enforce statutes and rules by reducing number of employees engaging in work and, potentially, impose a chilling effect on those who remain.

Trump also claims that presidents have exclusive power to control federal spending even after Congress has appropriated money. Trump argues that lawmakers’ budget actions “set a ceiling” on spending but t a floor — meaning president’s constitutional duty to “faithfully execute laws” includes discretion on wher to spend money. This interpretation could set up a court battle with Congress .

As a candidate, he also suggested that Federal Reserve, an independent entity that sets interest rates, should be subject to more presidential power. Though he has t offered details, any such move would represent a momentous change to how U.S. ecomic and monetary systems work.

Education

federal Department of Education would be targeted for elimination in a second Trump ministration. That does t mean that Trump wants Washington out of classrooms. 

He still proposes, among or maneuvers, using federal funding as lever to pressure K-12 school systems to abolish tenure and opt merit pay for teachers and to scrap diversity programs at all levels of education. 

He calls for pulling federal funding “for any school or program pushing Critical Race ory, ideology, or or inappropriate racial, sexual, or political content on our children.”

In higher education, Trump proposes taking over accreditation processes for colleges, a move he describes as his “secret weapon” against “Marxist Maniacs and lunatics” he says control higher education. 

Trump takes aim at higher education endowments, saying he will collect “billions and billions of dollars” from schools via “taxing, fining and suing excessively large private university endowments” at schools that do t comply with his edicts. 

That almost certainly would end up in protracted legal fights.

As in or policy areas, Trump isn’t actually proposing limiting federal power in higher education but strengning it. He calls for redirecting confiscated endowment money into an online “American Acemy” offering college credentials to all Americans without a tuition charges. “It will be strictly n-political, and re will be wokeness or jihism allowed—ne of that’s going to be allowed,” Trump said on v. 1, 2023.

Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid

Trump insists he would protect Social Security and Medicare, popular programs geared toward older Americans and among biggest pieces of federal spending pie each year. 

re are questions about how his proposal t to tax tip and overtime ws might affect Social Security and Medicare. If such plans eventually involved only income taxes, entitlement programs would t be affected. 

But exempting those ws from payroll taxes would reduce funding stream for Social Security and Medicare outlays. 

Trump has talked little about Medicaid but his first ministration, in general, defaulted to approving state requests for waivers of various federal rules and it broly endorsed state-level work requirements for recipients.

Affordable Care Act and Health Care

As he has since 2015, Trump calls for repealing Affordable Care Act and its subsidized health insurance marketplaces. But he still has t proposed a replacement: 

In a September debate, he insisted he h “concepts of a plan.” In latter sts of campaign, Trump played up his alliance with former presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a longtime critic of vaccines and of pesticides used in U.S. agriculture. 

Trump repeatedly told rally crowds that he would put Kennedy in charge of “making America healthy again.”

Climate and Energy

Trump, who claims falsely that climate change is a “hoax,” blasts Biden-era spending on cleaner energy designed to reduce U.S. reliance on fossil fuels. He proposes an energy policy – and transportation infrastructure spending – anchored to fossil fuels: ros, bridges and combustion-engine vehicles. “Drill, baby, drill!” was a regular chant at Trump rallies. Trump says he does t oppose electric vehicles but promises to end all Biden incentives to encour EV market development. Trump also pledges to roll back Biden-era fuel efficiency standards.

Workers' Rights

Trump and Vice President-elect JD Vance framed ir ticket as favoring America’s workers. But Trump could make it harder for workers to unionize. In discussing auto workers, Trump focused almost exclusively on Biden’s push toward electric vehicles. When he mentioned unions, it was often to lump “ union bosses and CEOs” toger as complicit in “this disastrous electric car scheme.” In an Oct. 23, 2023, statement, Trump said of United Auto Workers, “I’m telling you, you shouldn’t pay those dues.”

National Defense and Global Role

Trump’s rhetoric and policy approach in world affairs is more isolationist diplomatically, n-interventionist militarily and protectionist ecomically than U.S. has been since World War II. 

But details are more complicated. He pledges expansion of military, promises to protect Pentagon spending from austerity efforts and proposes a new missile defense shield — an old idea from Reagan era during Cold War. 

Trump insists he can end Russia’s war in Ukraine and Israel-Hamas war, without explaining how. 

Trump summarizes his approach through ar Reagan phrase: “peace through strength.” But he remains critical of NATO and top U.S. military brass. “I don’t consider m leers,” Trump said of Pentagon officials that Americans “see on television.” 

He repeatedly praised authoritarians like Hungary’s Viktor Orban and Russia’s Vlimir Putin .

(With AP inputs)