Maybe, you asked yourself, ‘What’s this got to do with me?’ The answer is a great deal – and here are ten reasons why the election of Donald Trump would be disastrous, not just for Americans but for all of us.
1. The economy: Trump is a protectionist. He wants high tariffs on goods entering the US so they don’t compete with American-made made products. The US is our biggest trading partner but the chances of that much talked about post-Brexit free trade deal being negotiated with a Trump administration are close to zero.
2. The Special Relationship: It might have had its occasional ups and downs but the US and the UK have had particularly close ties over many years, but Trump is an isolationist. He has no real interest in anything that is happening outside the borders of the US and that includes Britain.
3. The Far Right: There is no denying that Donald Trump has staked out a position for himself on the far right of the political spectrum. His election would be a great encouragement to the far right in the UK. What happens in America today, happens in the UK tomorrow – but let’s hope not this time.
4. The climate crisis: The US is the world’s second biggest carbon emitter. Trump is still denying that there is any such thing as the climate crisis. Under his previous term as president, there was little attempt to reduce America’s carbon footprint – under a future Trump administration, there will probably be even less.
5. Democracy: It might sound fanciful but Trump has made it clear, by his words and deeds, that he has contempt for democracy. By his refusal to accept that he lost the 2020 election presidential election – despite losing 26 court cases about this issue – he still insists that he won. He encouraged his supporters to invade the Capitol in Washington to try and block Biden’s nomination. He has said he will be a dictator on Day One of his presidency – not a prospect that many of us would be looking forward to.
6. Populism: In the last few years a growing number of populists – authoritarian politicians who offer simple solutions to complex problems and then blame minority groups when it all goes wrong – have gained power across the globe. The election of Trump would be a real boost to populists and dictators everywhere.
7. Ukraine: At this week’s presidential debate, Trump refused to say that he wanted Ukraine to win the war with Russia. He laughably said that he would settle the conflict in one day by getting Zelensky and Putin to sit down and talk to each other. Is he kidding?
8. The Middle East: The region is a powder keg, as hostilities between the Israeli and Palestinian forces show no sign of abating. The US is the only outside power that can influence Israel in terms of accepting a ceasefire – but that would require diplomatic skills that Trump has shown no signs of possessing.
9. China: There are now two super-powers facing each other across the world. The global community needs a strong, but stable, US, as a counter-weight to China. Trump is chaotic and the Chinese have indicated that they’d prefer Trump to be in the White House – they know he’d be so much easier to manipulate.
10. Finally, and most importantly, Trump is a bad man. He is a racist, a misogynist, a liar, a convicted felon and many other things. He is morally corrupt and should not be leading the United States.
I realise that some of you might think this is all over the top – after all, I hear you say, when he was in the White House between 2016 and 2020, he wasn’t that bad. But many of the senior staff who worked with Trump during his previous term are now urging his erstwhile supporters to vote for Kamala Harris – he is not fit to be President, they all say.
Trump was once a supporter and funder of the Democrats but he has now been taken over by the American far right, by the conspiracists, the anti-abortionists, the racists, the religious fundamentalists and a host of others who have managed to convince him that, if he is not declared the winner in November, it will be because the ‘deep state’ – a secret cabal of government agencies working for the ‘liberal left’ – will have yet again ‘stolen’ the election.
Donald Trump is a dangerous man and his election would be a disaster, not just for America, not just for Britain but for the rest of the world.
Let’s hope that Kamala Harris will be able to stop him.
*Ivor Gaber is Professor of Political Journalism and a former Westminster-based political correspondent.
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