Will Trump get a second term?

The absence of a credible and strong candidate from the Democratic Party is a major factor working in his favour

In the presidential poll scheduled for November 2020, the current incumbent Donald Trump is seeking re-election. In fact, Mr Trump filed for re-election on the very first day he took the oath of office as president of the United States on January 20, 2017. The performance of the US economy has undoubtedly been spectacular during the first two years of his presidency. Mr Trump promised a growth rate of 6 per cent when he became president in January 2017. While the economy grew at an annual rate of 3.2 per cent in the third quarter of 2017, GDP growth reached an annual rate of 4.2 per cent in the second quarter of 2018. This kind of growth has easily been the best for several years. 

Corporation tax cuts towards the end of 2017 coupled with Mr Trump’s ambitious “America First” and “Rebuild America” programmes stimulated the American economy that was fully reflected in the Dow Jones Industrial Average touching 20, 000 points for the first time in just 10 days after Mr Trump’s inauguration and now close to 25,000. Similarly, the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index and the Nasdaq also reached historical heights. Oil has fallen double digits with the US becoming a net exporter in November 2018 for the first time in 75 years.

Illustration by Ajay Mohanty

The unemployment rate in September 2018 stood at 3.7 per cent, the lowest since 1969, while unemployment for African Americans fell to 5.9 per cent, the lowest since the 1970s, and the unemployment rate for women reached a 65-year low. According to Ryan Sweet of Moody's Analytics, the labour market in the year 2000 had an unemployment rate below 4 per cent and demographic changes since then would suggest the current rate should be even below the 3.7 per cent in September 2018. African American unemployment also registered record low levels. On February 1, 2019, the Labour Department reported that payrolls have increased by 304,000 in January, which was about 130,000 more jobs than what economists in Wall Street had been predicting, notes John Cassidy in The New Yorker: The job gains were widely spread across the economy, with construction, health care, retail and leisure, and hospitality sectors showing significant strength. The report also said that wages were still rising at an annual rate of more than 3 per cent, while consumer price inflation was falling, because of cheaper energy prices.

According to a poll conducted by NBC News/Wall Street Journal in December 2018, however, only 28 per cent of people said that the US economy would improve, while 33 per cent felt that it would worsen; 37 per cent of people felt that it would stay at the same level. This is markedly different from the January 2018 poll when 35 per cent of people had said that the economy would get better, while only 20 per cent had felt it would worsen. Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics, however, held that the current boom would bust early in the next decade when the fiscal stimulus fades and the next recession will arrive on June 20, 2020.

Examples of Jimmy Carter who lost to Ronald Reagan in 1980 and George H W Bush who was defeated by Bill Clinton in 1992 during recessionary periods are being cited to project the bleak prospects for Mr Trump’s re-election. According to Alex Shepherd of The New Republic, “Trump’s re-election doesn’t hinge on recession (December 8, 2018)", however, there is limited evidence to suggest that recession would doom the president. After all, Mr Trump defeated Hillary Clinton of the Democratic Party when the US economy was doing so well in 2016. Further, as a student who spent the academic year 1979-80 in two US schools in Pennsylvania and Minnesota and one who was closely watching the election campaign, I wish to hold that Jimmy Carter lost his election in 1980 not because of recession but on account of the Iran hostage crisis.

In an article “Why Trump is the favourite in 2020” published in The Atlantic on November 12, 2018, David Graham sounds highly optimistic about Trump’s re-election based on The New York Times op-ed in September 2018 which had said Mr Trump stood a decent chance at the re-election.

While the “emerging democratic majority” comprising a greater percentage of blacks, Hispanics, Asians as well as younger voters of all races were supposed to enjoy support in the Rust Belt region (areas that witnessed decline in industrial production since the 1980s) comprising of central New York, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Northern Illinois, Iowa, and Wisconsin, Mr Trump won in Ohio, Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania, and came close in Minnesota.  In Graham’s opinion, “If Trump could hold most of the states he won in 2016, he is well on his way to victory.” 

Amy Chick in his article in The New York Times on September 28, 2018, holds that reality TV has always been the guidebook for the US presidency. Mr Trump’s shows like — American Idol, Lost, The West Wing, and The Apprentice — have made all other entertainments shows like NFL games and various award shows pale into total insignificance.  

Further unlike in the past, Mr Trump now enjoys the full support of the Republican Party. The absence of a credible and strong candidate from the Democratic Party who can take on Mr Trump is a major factor working in favour of Mr Trump. Among the only two respectable faces of the Democratic Party, Bernie Sanders is too old, while Joe Biden, former vice president, had failed to make a mark when he had unsuccessfully contested on an earlier occasion. Further, Mr Biden is considered to be out of tune with the US Democratic Party of today.

Jonathan Yates, Iowa View contributor, cites history to support Mr Trump: Mr Nixon, Mr Reagan, Mr Clinton and Barack Obama, who had lost seats in the House of Representatives, were re-elected for another term as president two years later.

From the above analysis, Mr Trump should be able to secure his second term without any great difficulty. Once re-elected, Mr Trump is bound to go down in history as one of the most influential presidents of the United States. 
The writer is a former staff member of the International Monetary Fund, Washington DC