Great promises don’t equal great presidents. When first running for president, candidates take different stands on issues in order to gain supporters. Based on their stance on specific issues candidates make promises on how they plan to change it when they get into office. However, once in office, it has proven to be a lot harder to implement the great ideas they came in with. Often, their actions drift from the words they once said, leading to the implementation of new plans.
Obama: A Presidency Built on Hope
Barack Obama first announced his presidential campaign on February 10, 2007. Throughout his campaign, he ran on a platform of HOPE. He wasn’t focused on helping only one type of person, but every person, making promises to the working class.
During his Democratic National Convention speech in 2004, he made it clear that the U.S. is neither fully liberal nor fully conservative.
“There’s not a liberal America and a conservative America—there’s the United States of America.”
When elected into office, he inherited a country that was exhausted financially and emotionally. From wars overseas in Iraq and Afghanistan to the 2008 financial crisis that left many unemployed, Obama was a beacon of hope for working families and marginalized communities.
He set out to create a government that benefited the majority of people.
During his administration, Obama prioritized long-term economic recovery through stimulus efforts and regulatory reforms. Some of the most influential bills that he passed included economic stimulus, health care reform and reforming the legislation of the nation’s financial institutions.
Trump: A Presidency Built on Making America Great Again
Donald Trump’s presidency leaned into division and confrontation. A complete 180 of what the American public had grown accustomed to with Obama.
Focused on separating the U.S from other countries Trump planned early on in his campaign to build a wall as stated in his campaign announcement speech in 2015.
“We will build a great wall along the southern border—and Mexico will pay for the wall.”
When elected into office Trump inherited a country that was already on the rise, employment rates were falling, the economy had steadily been recovering for years and major industries were stabilizing. Rather than continuing this slow, but steady progress he chose to lead the nation in another direction. His administration prioritized nationalism, deregulation and aggressive immigration policies, coining the term ‘Making America Great Again’ or MAGA.
Trump’s economic agenda relied heavily on rapid, short term growth. His signature achievement includes the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017. This delivered substantial benefits to corporations and the wealthy while providing smaller, temporary relief to working-class families. Trump promotes these policies as transformative, but when compared to previous presidents it is not something out of the ordinary.
His first time in office would ultimately become the first presidency in American history to be marked by two impeachments. Making his first term something to go down in history.
Obama vs. Trump
All this goes to show how two people in such high power, can have completely opposite views when it involves their morals. In this case, Obama demonstrates his commitment to unity, hope and inclusion, while Trump’s actions reflect his assertive qualities, hardline policies and a dominance-driven style of leadership.
Obama emphasizes in his campaign that he wanted a collective identity for his country. He promised to the people that in his presidency he would take action in restoration and togetherness through the difficult national moment, the Great Recession. With his plan to run for president at such a difficult time, he sought to demand large recovery efforts. His main focus was on economic recovery, financial regulation and healthcare. Although he did go through with his word, he had faced political resistance. Even if some projects were delayed or even limited, he never went back on his word he had given to the people.
On the contrary, Trump had campaigned on the term ‘Make America Great Again,’ a smokescreen meant to hide his true intentions. He made vague promises to the people how he was going to better the state, to derive from his true intentions. Trump ran for president during a period of economic stability, which gave him an easy pathway to pave over previously implemented ideas and change them with his own. With his vague promises as a distraction, it allowed him to focus on nationalism, short-term economic boosts and reducing restrictions on industry. He had taken action on only half of the many promises he had made to the people, mainly due to lack of funding and construction being hindered.
