Opinionistas

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Why a Trump victory would spell disaster for climate action and global democracy

4 Nov 2024

Trump has no respect for democratic institutions. His charming authoritarian friends — Javier Milei, Jair Bolsonaro, Viktor Orbán, Nigel Farage, Vladimir Putin, Bibi Netanyahu, to name a few — would all be thrilled with a Trump win.

I have heard some progressive people in both South Africa and the United States, disappointed with the Democrats, argue that a Trump victory wouldn’t make that much difference.

They couldn’t be more wrong.

The Gaza issue, probably more than any other, causes disillusionment. Could anything be worse for Palestinians than the Democrats’ systematic appeasement of Benjamin Netanyahu?

The terrible truth is, I’m afraid, yes.

Kamala Harris at least has some conception of Palestinian humanity and believes, albeit very vaguely, in the necessity of a Palestinian state. Donald Trump would gladly give Netanyahu the go-ahead to complete his ethnic cleansing programme. He won’t give a damn whether humanitarian aid reaches Palestinians.

As Bernie Sanders noted recently, Trump sees Gaza as a wonderful beachfront real estate opportunity. I can understand the anger of Palestinian sympathisers in the US, but to support Trump, or not to vote (almost the same thing), would be a grand act of nose amputation. I just hope that their anger does not cloud their judgement.

But, painful and urgent as the Gaza issue is, there is a long list of other horrors that would come with a Trump presidency.

Next four years are crucial

As far as the rest of the world is concerned, impending climate catastrophe is probably on top of the list. If Trump wins, we can simply kiss goodbye any hope of restraining climate change. The next four years are crucial.

With Trump at the helm of the biggest economy in the world, the game is basically over. He will remove incentives to green energy, encourage shale gas drilling, and remove environmental regulations on oil and gas expansion. Many other countries will follow his lead.

The Christian supporters of Trump who claim to care so much about the family seem remarkably unconcerned about the future of their children. The 99%+ of scientists who agree about the human impact on climate are, apparently, part of a big hoax.

Then, of course, for American women, this would be a disaster. Access to reproductive health would be terribly constrained. Not to mention the general male chauvinist backlash against women’s gains in recent decades.

How would it feel to have, according to multiple witnesses, a sexual predator in the White House? What does that say about how seriously US society is taking sexual violence?

A Trump victory would be a great bonanza for the super-rich, with fresh tax breaks and further labour and environmental deregulation. The poor would be much worse off. There would be huge cutbacks to welfare. The crucial child support benefit, recognised to have cut poverty significantly in the US, would be reduced or dumped.

Crucial federal agencies, such as the Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema), will be underfunded. Not to mention the drug regulation agency and the hurricane monitoring unit.

Although most Americans are stubbornly blind to it, the US economy has been doing extraordinarily well under Joe Biden. Of course there’s still huge inequality, but there has been good growth, very low unemployment, rising real wages. Inflation has been coming down. The US’s success is especially striking in comparison with the economic woes in Europe and China.

Experts discredited

Yet Trump and the Republicans have managed to convince most of the country that they are in a recession! As in the Chinese Cultural Revolution, they have managed to discredit the experts, who devote their lives to analysing this stuff. Trump wants to take massive risks with the economy by imposing stringent tariff barriers that would affect the world’s trade system and probably trigger a damaging tariff war.

There’s also the small matter of democracy. I fear the growing momentum towards authoritarianism in the world. Trump, as we know, has no respect for democratic institutions. He did, after all, try to overthrow the state after losing the 2020 election. Now he wants to strip the powers of autonomous federal agencies and put friendly election officials into key states.

Trump’s charming authoritarian friends — Javier Milei, Jair Bolsonaro, Viktor Orbán, Nigel Farage, Vladimir Putin, Bibi Netanyahu, to name a few — would all be thrilled with a Trump win. Even Xi Jinping, who would hate the trade barriers, would revel in the dysfunction and polarisation that Trump brings to the most powerful Western democracy.

University autonomy would come under threat. We’ve already seen this in a number of Republican-controlled states, where anything deemed “woke” faces attack and defunding.

The current Republican leaders, for example, want to stop universities from teaching courses that discuss structural racial inequality in the US. Liberal principals would be pressured to resign; student protests would face more repression. Books could even be stripped from library shelves.

There’s plenty more. Trump promises a ruthless anti-immigrant drive. Undocumented immigrants would be hounded out of the country, irrespective of the human and economic consequences. Legal immigration and refugee status for unskilled and poor people would be more tightly restricted.

Extremist federal judges

Trump would also appoint dozens, if not hundreds, of new extremist federal judges (especially if the Republicans win the Senate, which seems likely.)

There would be zero chance of greater gun regulation, despite America’s almost daily roll call of mass killings. There would be less official tolerance for LGBTQI+ individuals and communities (and more space for anti-queer hatemongers.)

Ukraine would be sold down the river. Yes, Trump may well succeed in bringing an end to that war, but at the expense of Ukrainian sovereignty and/or large chunks of its land being ceded to a bullying nuclear-armed authoritarian neighbour.

There may be some congressional restraints on his power, but don’t be fooled. This man is dangerous. To the US and to the world. If you still have any hope of slowing climate change or rolling back the tide of patriarchal authoritarianism in the world, this election matters.

It matters a lot. DM

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Opinionistas

Next four years are crucial

Experts discredited

Extremist federal judges