Donald Trump’s resounding victory in last week’s election should not have come as a shock to anyone.
The 45th and 47th president of the US rode an unprecedentedly strong anti-incumbency wave that has seen almost every governing party around the globe severely punished at the ballot box in 2024.
Vice-president Kamala Harris was actually among the best performers of all incumbents who faced elections in rich countries this year, a testament to her disciplined campaign, Trump’s historically unpopular candidacy, and America’s world-beating economy.
Still, this wasn’t enough amid widespread voter frustration with persistently high prices caused by the global post-pandemic inflation surge and elevated immigration levels.
A hyperpolarised information environment that divides America into two partisan echo chambers made it nigh impossible for the Harris campaign to effectively counter these headwinds.
No party had ever managed to retain the White House when incumbent approval is as low as it is and so many Americans believe the country is on the wrong track. Seen in this light, Harris’s defeat on election night was more likely than not.
The first Republican to win the popular vote in 20 years on the back of gains with nearly every demographic group in almost every geography, Trump will take office not only with a strong mandate but also with unified control of Congress and a conservative Supreme Court majority.
This will give the incoming administration free rein to enact Trump’s sweeping domestic policy agenda, radically remake the federal government, and rewrite institutional norms with little in the way of independent checks and balances. But if Trump’s return will profoundly impact the US, it may matter even more for the rest of the world.
Many expect US foreign policy in the second Trump administration will simply be a repeat of his first term, when there were no major wars (other than the winding down of America’s longest in Afghanistan) and he even scored some notable foreign policy successes, including a revitalised North American free trade agreement, the Abraham Accords, fairer cost-sharing among Nato members, and new and stronger security alliances in Asia.
And to be sure, Trump himself is still the same person he was four years ago, for better and worse. Trump’s worldview also remains unchanged, as does his assertively unilateralist and transactional “America First” approach to foreign policy.
Ideologically aligned staff
But other things have changed. For one, while the president-elect remains personally uninterested in the business of governance, his second administration will be staffed with more ideologically aligned and experienced senior officials ready to implement his “America First” agenda from the start.
Gone are the institutionalist career staffers who often checked the president’s most disruptive impulses — and the less seasoned loyalists who later replaced them. Trump’s second-term foreign policy advisers will be much more loyal than at the start and more experienced than at the end of his first term.
Most importantly, the world has become more dangerous since he last held the job. Trump’s first-term accomplishments took place amid historically low interest rates and a generally benign geopolitical context.
Two regional wars, intensifying competition with China, serious chaos threatened by emboldened rogue actors like Russia, Iran and North Korea, a sluggish global economy, and disruptive technologies like artificial intelligence will place entirely new demands on Trump’s leadership.
The stakes are higher, and the implications of an unpredictable “America First” foreign policy much more far-reaching, than they were in 2016, with a higher likelihood of more extreme outcomes.
While Trump will still be able to get some foreign policy wins by virtue of his transactional style and the influence that comes with being president of the most powerful country in the world, the potential for things to go sideways is far greater in this environment.
China
The best example of this is China, which Trump will take a much harder line towards after the Biden administration managed to stabilise relations. This will begin with a push to hike tariffs on Chinese imports to address the bilateral trade deficit.
China faces severe economic problems and will tread carefully to avoid unnecessary crises. Depending on how prohibitive Trump’s tariffs are and whether the Chinese see room to negotiate rather than retaliate, it’s possible the escalation could prompt a breakthrough.
But it’s more likely the confrontational approach favoured by Trump’s hawkish cabinet as well as Congressional Republicans will lead to a sharp worsening of the relationship and a new cold war that ultimately increases the risk of direct military confrontation.
In the Middle East, the president-elect will try to expand his signature Abraham Accords to include Saudi Arabia while giving Israel a blank cheque to prosecute its wars as it sees fit, with no pressure to limit the humanitarian toll or escalation risk of its actions. Most concerningly, Trump will support — if not actively encourage — a decision by an emboldened Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to deal with the Iranian nuclear threat once and for all, risking a broader conflagration and significant energy disruptions.
Ukraine conditions
By contrast, Trump has vowed to end the war in Ukraine within “a day” — possibly before he’s even inaugurated — by unilaterally pressuring presidents Volodymyr Zelensky and Vladimir Putin to accept a ceasefire that freezes the conflict along current territorial lines, using military aid to Kyiv as leverage over both sides. Whether they will accept the terms or not is an open question.
Much will depend on how Europe responds. Front-line Nato states — Poland, the Baltics and the Nordics — see Ukraine’s defence as existential to their own national security and would be willing to incur the significant costs of protecting Ukraine if the US bails.
Others might relish the chance to cut a deal, whether for ideological reasons like Hungary, for political reasons like Italy, or for fiscal reasons like Germany. Trump’s second term could be the action-forcing event that finally unites Europe and galvanises a stronger, more consolidated, and “strategically autonomous” EU security response. Or it could reinforce existing divisions within Europe, severely weaken the transatlantic alliance, and invite further Russian aggression.
Donald Trump’s return at a time of heightened geopolitical turbulence will usher in a period of increased volatility and uncertainty on the global stage.
More likely to precipitate both catastrophic breakdowns and improbable breakthroughs, Trump 2.0 is a recipe for a sharper and deeper geopolitical recession.
• Bremmer ( @ianbremmer) is president and founder of Eurasia Group and GZERO Media.
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