What ‘Wrong’ Did President Trump Do To Deserve Defeat? – OpEd

With the US Presidential election to be finalized in the next few days and more than 29 million people are reported to have already voted, several pre-election surveys have indicated that Joe Biden could win and President Trump will lose.

At this stage, one cannot be sure as to what would be the result of the Presidential election, since a number of poll predictions have proved wrong in the past.

In any case, if President Trump were to lose the election, it would not be due to any serious wrong that he has committed in four years of his administration, but rather largely due to the sustained and determined hate campaign against him by sections of the media and sworn critics. When Trump filed his nomination as the Republican candidate around four years back, the same section of media and critics started criticizing him. They predicted that it would be a disaster for the US if Trump would be elected, even before he assumed office.

A careful analysis of the Trump administration during the last four years would clearly indicate that there is no case for him to be defeated  in the  current Presidential election.

Trump lived up to his poll promise made, which was “America first” policy. Trump implemented a firm program to prevent domination of China in the global arena, which was necessary to ensure success of his “America first” policy. It is well known and beyond doubt that China made significant progress in recent years mainly by exploiting the American market to dump its goods and also benefited considerably by acquiring technology from American companies by way of collaboration or purchase of technology. To this extent China has grown and the USA has lost. Therefore, Trump’s trade war and other acts against China was in tune with the “America first” policy. He has to be given credit for this, which section of media and his critics have not done. 

It is certainly true that US citizens suffered from job loss, as many US companies started investing in China instead of doing it in the USA and also employed people from developing countries, since their wage expectations are much less than the US counterparts. This started happening, much before Trump assumed office. Trump wanted to stop this practice, which was causing joblessness in the USA and as well as investment loss, by checking the flow of immigrants into the USA and directly and indirectly asking US companies to invest in the USA and recruit US citizens for the job to the extent possible. What is wrong with this?

Trump’s decision to withdraw troops from Afghanistan was right, to prevent loss of lives in a war in a third world country. America has paid too big a price for involving itself in the local conflict in Afghanistan, for which previous President Obama was largely responsible.

The  funding of WHO by the USA was stopped by President Trump, as he suspected that the President of WHO was partisan in his approach and did not warn the world at the right time about the seriousness of the COVID 19 virus. The USA was the biggest donor to WHO and certainly the US is entitled to stop funding WHO, if it would suspect the role of WHO.

Trump’s decision to withdraw from the US commitment to Paris Climate Accord has been criticized. Looking from distance, this criticism may look justifiable. But, Trump’s view that the Paris Climate Conference excessively blamed the developed countries including USA for the climate crisis was not wrong. While President Trump withdrew from the commitment of the USA to the Paris Climate Conference, he has not stopped the climate protection measures in the USA. Trump’s annoyance that China’s contribution to  global warming has not been criticized by the Paris Climate Conference  under the pretext that China is a developing country, is justifiable. The fact is that China is a well developed country and it cannot take cover to get concessions in adhering to climate norms, that has been accorded to developing countries.

Trump’s extraordinary success in bringing peaceful relations between  Israel and some Middle East countries like UAE have contributed to reduce the tension in the Middle east region. No critic has taken note of this.

Trump has been blamed for the black – white conflict in recent months in the USA. This is not a new phenomenon and it was been there during Obama’s administration and Clinton’s administration also.

Some critics have accused Trump of favoring the whites, for which there is no justification. On the other hand, President Obama visited a mosque to woo Muslim voters and exhorted the blacks to vote for his party during the earlier Presidential election, which is a partisan move and Trump’s critics have conveniently ignored this. Trump has not made such a partisan appeal.

Trump has been blamed for thousands of deaths due to the COVID 19 crisis in the USA. In a situation, when a suitable vaccine to treat COVID 19 has not been available, no other person could have handled the situation better. It is said that Trump did not alert the nation sufficiently early. But, there is no indication that early measures such as social distancing and wearing of masks could have saved the situation. Further, when some governors insisted on wearing masks and social distancing, several people in the USA protested. India is one country where the government took measures to prevent the spread of COVID 19 by insisting on social distancing and wearing of masks even in the month of March. Things have not become better due to this early intervention.

All said and done, Trump has implemented the pre-election promises reasonably well during the four years of his administration.

It is true that Trump has criticized his critics and media in sharp terms. But the fact is that he has been retaliating, when his critics and sections of the media did not show any courtesy to him and did not hesitate to publish highly critical cartoons and even abusive articles and with the least regard for the position of the US President.

Several of the criticisms against Trump such as tax evasion etc., were all advanced before the last Presidential election, which obviously had been rejected by US citizens when he was elected as US President.

Even if Trump does lose, history will judge his overall administration better than the section of media and motivated critics of President Trump.