The conditions that delivered Donald Trump a stunning election victory in 2016 haven’t changed. If anything, they’ve become even more pronounced over the past eight years. That’s why Trump will become just the second president in American history to serve two non-consecutive terms.
Trump won in 2016 because Washington elites had forgotten and neglected the common man. Democrats and Republicans had become virtually indistinguishable from each other – both parties were pro-war, pro-bailout, and all too willing to sell out American workers to corporate interests. They put the pursuit of power and money ahead of the country’s best interests, and the American people knew it.
As recently as 2006, the Democrats won a resounding midterm election victory running on an anti-war agenda. Over the course of Barack Obama’s presidency, however, they turned into pro-war, pro-censorship elitists, disdainful of the working Americans who had historically supported their party.
But when Donald Trump came down that golden escalator in 2015, he captured the popular imagination and began a fundamental transformation of American politics.
Trump defied the self-serving bipartisan Washington consensus on a wide range of issues, notably including foreign policy (he promised to end the “forever wars” that cost our country thousands of lives and trillions of dollars) and trade (he vowed to renegotiate so-called “free trade” deals such as NAFTA that really just sold out American workers to buy foreign influence).
I was among the first to board the “Trump Train” in May 2015, and I’ve continued to support him in various capacities – official and unofficial – ever since. As someone who spent decades in politics, starting with the 1988 presidential campaign, I had witnessed firsthand the transformation of the party of Reagan into the party of Bush. Trump promised a new paradigm – America First – and he kept that promise.
Trump understands, as Ronald Reagan did, and Teddy Roosevelt before him, that the best way to achieve peace is to prepare for war. That’s how he became the first president since Jimmy Carter to complete a term in office without getting America involved in any new military conflicts. Instead, he defeated ISIS, diplomatically isolated Iran, kept Russia in check, cowed China, brokered historic peace agreements between Israel and its neighbors, and responsibly scaled back our military presence in the Middle East.
He also fulfilled his promise to secure a square deal for American workers. He rejected the bipartisan consensus that hollowed out our industrial economy, renegotiating NAFTA and replacing it with the USMCA, a genuinely fair trade agreement that lets American workers compete on a level playing field.
Consistently, Trump has proven himself to be the champion of the little guy and the middle class. The elites can’t fathom his enduring appeal, because they don’t care to understand the struggles of ordinary Americans.
Even if they wanted to understand Trump’s appeal, the elites are blinded by rage. Trump stripped them of their power and returned that power to the American people. They’ve been out to get him ever since.
As we’ve seen consistently over the past eight years, there is literally nothing the elites won’t do to “get” Trump. They tried using the political process, but manufactured pseudo-scandals and two failed impeachments didn’t work. They tried weaponizing the legal system against him, but that effort has mostly failed, as well – they couldn’t get him thrown off the ballot, they couldn’t “lock him up” before the election, and even when they were able to secure a rigged conviction it resulted in an outpouring of support from ordinary Americans.
Whether there was any conspiracy behind the two failed assassination attempts against Trump this summer will be a question for the history books, but what is clear is that the Democrats’ apocalyptic rhetoric about Trump sends an unmistakable signal to zealots and madmen.
The Democrats have even taken the extraordinary step of executing a coup against their own sitting president and replacing him with arguably the least-qualified presidential candidate possible. Despite propping Kamala Harris up with fawning media coverage and over a billion dollars in donations, she still can’t close the deal, and the Democrat establishment is wetting its pants at the prospect of a second Trump term. That’s exactly what they’re going to get.
Donald Trump still represents the common man fighting back against the corruption and cronyism of the elites, and that’s why he’s going to win.
Mark Serrano is a former senior advisor to Donald J. Trump for President and the founder of ProActive Strategies.