WASHINGTON (AP) — In his first 100 days, President Donald Trump exerted his power in a sweep and scale that has no easy historical comparison.
His actions target the architecture of the New Deal and the Great Society, but they hardly stop there. He is also rewriting the Reagan Republican orthodoxy of free trade and strong international alliances. All of it is in service of fundamentally altering the role of government in American life and the U.S. place in the world.
To implement parts of his vision, he deployed the world’s richest person, Elon Musk, to dismantle the federal workforce, deciding only after the fact if the cuts had gone too far.
Trump also has unilaterally declared the power to remake the post-World War II alliance with Europe that has largely maintained peace for nearly 80 years. The Republican president has made extraordinary emergency declarations to rewrite the rules of global trade, setting off panic in markets and capitals around the world. And he has ordered the removal of migrants to a prison in El Salvador without judicial review.
What’s more, he has taken direct aim at law, media, public health and culture, attempting to bring all to heel, with some surprising success.
Many of his actions were promised during his campaign but he put them in place with a blunt force aggressiveness.
Here is a look at the most consequential first 100 days of an American presidency since Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Economy
Trump has tried to bend the U.S. economy to his will. But one force is unbowed: the financial markets.
Trump says the outcome of his tariffs will eventually be “beautiful.” So far, it’s been an difficult three months with consumer confidence plummeting, stock markets convulsing and investors losing confidence in the credibility of Trump’s policies. It has become a time of anxiety instead of his promised golden age of prosperity.
Trump has tried to bend the U.S. economy to his will. But one force is unbowed: the financial markets.
Trump says the outcome of his tariffs will eventually be “beautiful.” So far, it’s been an difficult three months with consumer confidence plummeting, stock markets convulsing and investors losing confidence in the credibility of Trump’s policies. It has become a time of anxiety instead of his promised golden age of prosperity.
Trump has managed to reshape the economy through executive power, largely bypassing the Republican-controlled Congress. He has imposed hundreds of billions of dollars in tariffs, including on America’s two largest trading partners, Mexico and Canada. Chinese goods are getting taxed at a combined 145%.
The trade penalties increased tensions with the European Union and sent Japan and South Korea rushing to negotiate. Despite clear evidence of American economic supremacy, Trump claimed that the U.S. has been ripped off by trade.
The president says his tariffs will create domestic factory jobs, cover the cost of an income tax cut plan that could exceed $5 trillion over 10 years, repay the $36 trillion national debt and also serve as leverage to renegotiate trade on terms favoring the United States. But his tariffs could reduce an average household’s disposable income by $4,900, according to The Budget Lab at Yale University.
Trump has used his office to promote investment announcements that have yet to make much of an economic impact. Trump talked up a $500 billion investment in artificial intelligence by OpenAI, Oracle and SoftBank. He invited Hyundai executives to the White House for the announcement of a new steel mill in Louisiana. But factory construction slipped in February and outside forecasters have increased the likelihood of a recession this year
He has rewarded the coal and oil sectors by attacking alternative energy, yet his tariffs pushed up the price of the steel and other materials that the energy industry needs to build out production.
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has said Trump will take full ownership of the economy in the final three months of this year, when the administration policies are fully in place.
By JOSH BOAK/Associated Press
Boak covers the White House and economic policy for The Associated Press. He joined the AP in 2013.
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