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WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump took office nearly four years ago as an outsider who vowed to get things done quickly on behalf of the American people through sheer force of will and unmatched knowledge of the art of the bargain.
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Trump pushed through the most significant reform of the American tax system since President Ronald Reagan. Trump, as he said he would, tipped the Supreme Court further to the right with the confirmation of two conservative justices and likely a third, Amy Coney Barrett, in the coming days.
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His promise to be tough on illegal immigration has resulted in an increase in migrant apprehensions at the US-Mexico border.
But Trump has also faced the same harsh truth that every one of his predecessors in the White House learned: governing is rarely easy.
A look at some of the president’s unfinished business as he asks voters for a second term in the White House:
HEALTH CARE
Trump has managed to undermine President Barack Obama’s health care law, but he has failed to deliver on his promise to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act.
His administration has managed to dismantle parts of the law. The enrollment periods have been shortened, some subsidies have been canceled and the individual mandate, the fine for people without health insurance, has been eliminated.
Trump says he is still focused on replacing it with something “much better and much less expensive.” He said in an interview with CBS’s “60 Minutes” that “it will be very good” if the Supreme Court ends “Obamacare” when the justices hear the challenges next month.
The number of uninsured Americans has risen under Trump’s supervision. According to Census Bureau data released last month, nearly 30 million people in the US were without coverage at some point during 2019, about 1 million more than the previous year.
READ: Trump Signs US Healthcare Executive Orders That May Have Little Impact
“WARS WITHOUT END”
Trump has made only modest progress toward fulfilling his 2016 promise to bring home all the troops from what he calls America’s “never-ending wars.”
When Trump took over the White House, the number of American forces in Afghanistan was roughly 8,400 and there were roughly 6,800 troops in Iraq.
In one year, the number of troops in Afghanistan amounted to about 15,000. Trump approved requests from additional troop commanders to reverse setbacks in training Afghan forces, fight an increasingly dangerous Islamic State group and put enough pressure on the Taliban to force them to the peace table.
In February, the United States and the Taliban signed an agreement calling for the eventual complete withdrawal of US forces from Afghanistan.
With his sights set on the election, Trump has accelerated his push to bring troops home, mocking that all American troops could be out of Afghanistan by the end of the year.
Pentagon officials said the number of troops in Afghanistan will drop to 4,500 in November. But defense officials insist there are no plans for all troops to return from Afghanistan by the end of the year.
US officials also say there is currently no approved plan to reduce the number to 2,500 by early next year. The officials were not authorized to publicly discuss the internal deliberations and spoke on condition of anonymity.
In Iraq, the number of US troops has fallen from around 5,000 to about 3,000, although officials say the number fluctuates more as units move in and out.
WALL
During his 2016 primary run, Trump sought to mark his ground as a hardline immigration enforcer who would build “a great, great wall on our southern border.”
“And I will make Mexico pay for that wall,” Trump said when launching his candidacy for the White House in June 2015. “Remember my words.”
Almost four years later, Trump still has work to do to complete his wall, and American taxpayers have paid for much of what has been completed despite promises to the contrary.
The president’s administration has promised to build 450 miles by the end of this year and has so far built 371.
Trump has replaced hundreds of miles of old, worn-out barriers, meant just to stop cars, with 30-foot high fences that are much more difficult to overcome and prevent wildlife from crossing the border.
Conservationists in Arizona, where most of the building has been done, say the new wall is detrimental to surrounding wildlife and ecosystems.
Mexico has steadfastly refused to pay for the border wall, although Trump suggested earlier this year that the wall is paid for, in part, with remittances from Mexican immigrants working in the United States.
To date, the money comes from the United States Treasury – that is, today’s taxpayers and future ones who will inherit the federal debt. To the extent that people who entered the United States illegally are kicking the wall, it is because they are working and paying taxes like other workers.
Trump also freed up $ 3.6 billion for the wall last year by diverting money from military construction projects, as well as $ 2.5 billion from approved drug spending.
PEACE IN THE MIDDLE EAST
Early in his presidency, Trump expressed confidence that his administration could negotiate a long-term peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians. “We will make it,” Trump declared in May 2017. He put his son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner in charge.
Trump moved the US embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, a move that was hailed by Israelis and the president’s evangelical Christian supporters in the US, but which angered Palestinian leaders. It scored a major victory in recent weeks with the United States pushing Bahrain, Sudan and the United Arab Emirates, three Arab states, to normalize relations with Israel.
The normalization of relations between Israel and the three Arab nations is undoubtedly an important achievement. But agreements between nations that have never been in direct conflict do not move the ball significantly to achieve the great and elusive goal of achieving peace between the Palestinians and the Israelis.
INFRASTRUCTURE
Multiple attempts by the White House to designate an “infrastructure week,” each effort quickly overshadowed by other issues, have become something of an administration punchline.
In his 2016 victory speech, Trump said he would rebuild the nation’s highways, bridges, tunnels, airports, schools and hospitals, making America’s infrastructure “second to none” and putting millions to work in the process.
Nearly four years later, Trump’s dizzying rhetoric has failed to produce legislation.
In April 2019, Trump reached an agreement with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Democrat of California, and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, DN.Y., to pursue an infrastructure plan for 2 trillion dollars. In March, he resurrected the idea of a “VERY BIG AND BOLD” plan for infrastructure spending to help shake up the staggering economy after the hit of the coronavirus pandemic.
While Pelosi and Schumer went back to supporting big spending on infrastructure, Senate Republicans have raged at the deficit spending and Trump’s sales pitch has gone nowhere with his own party.
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TRUMP TAXES
On the stage of the debate four years ago, Trump said his federal income taxes were “under a routine audit” but promised they would be released as soon as the IRS finished.
Four years later, Trump says the IRS has yet to complete its work and that the president has yet to follow through on his promise to release his tax returns. No law prevents Trump from making his tax returns public while under audit.
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Questions about Trump’s tax returns, and his financial situation in general, have only increased after revelations that he is personally responsible for a debt of more than $ 400 million. That kind of debt burden, ethics experts say, raises concerns that it could be manipulated to influence American policy by those to whom it is in debt.
The New York Times reported last month that Trump’s debt includes more than $ 300 million in loans due over the next four years.
Trump dismisses his debt load as a “peanut” compared to his assets.
The president is the only post-Watergate president who has not released his tax returns.
