The EconomistFebruary 3rd 2018 29For daily analysis and debate on America, visit
Economist.com/unitedstates
Economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica1“I
N MANY ways,” said one pundit after
Donald Trump’s maiden address to
Congress 11 months ago, “it was the long-
awaited pivot that Trump has always
promised...He was disciplined, didn’t veer
much at all from the script and hit his
marks.” This assessment reflected where
Candidate Trump had set the bar. Reading
from a teleprompter and not belittling op-
ponents was enough to get some critics to
call him presidential. Itdid notlast long.
Four days later Mr Trump took to Twitter to
accuse Barack Obama, falsely, of master-
minding a plot to tap his phone during “the
very sacred election process”.
A year into his term, public opinion on
the 45th president has calcified. His ap-
proval ratings are stuck right where they
were a couple of weeks after his inaugura-
tion: just under40%, according to Gallup.
For a president in office while wages are
growing and unemployment at a 17-year
low, that is extraordinarily poor. Though
frustrating for the White House, there is
wisdom in the polls’ consistency. The pres-
ident is who he is, and he is unlikely to
change. This matters because a more popu-
lar president with more control over his
party’s fractious congressional wing might
actually be able to pull off the proposed
deal on immigration that was the most
controversial bit of his first State of the Un-
ion address, delivered this week.ing should go to new construction rather
than repair, and how he will convince a Re-
publican-controlled Congress to come up
with the money.
What is clear is that the president has a
habit of overpromising on infrastructure.
He said he would have a plan finalised
during his first 100 days in office. In last
year’s speech to Congress he vowed to pro-
duce legislation for a $1trn infrastructure
plan. Republican congressmen promised a
plan by late spring. Last April Mr Trump
said he would have one in a few weeks.
Just this month a White House aide said Mr
Trump would present a concrete plan in
two to four weeks. Infrastructure seems
less a real policy priority than a shiny bau-
ble that the White House dangles from
time to time.The Oslo accords
So far, so familiar. The mostsubstantive
proposal made by the president was on im-
migration. It is as follows: a path to citizen-
ship for 1.8m undocumented immigrants
who came to America as children, includ-
ing all 700,000 or so DACArecipients. And,
in exchange, a wall on the Mexican border;
more immigration police; ending the Div-
ersity Visa lottery, which gives visas to im-
migrants from countries that send few peo-
ple to America; and restricting family
reunification visas, which Mr Trump
claimed allow “a single immigrant [to]
bring in virtually unlimited numbers of
distant relatives”. Immigrants can sponsor
children, spouses, parents, brothers and
sisters, in limited numbers. Chain migra-
tion, as this is known, is neuralgic on the
right. To bolster his case, Mr Trump assert-
ed that terrorists entered on family reunifi-
cation and diversity visas, and that violent
gang members entered America as “unac-This year, like last, Mr Trump mostly
stuck to his script when speaking to Con-
gress. As is customary, he feinted toward
unity, urging politicians to “seek out com-
mon ground” and restating his “righteous
mission—to make America great again for
all Americans”. He sounded familiar
themes on trade, particularly that other
countries have taken advantage of Ameri-
ca, and that “the era of economic surrender
is over”. The president promised “strong
enforcement of our trade rules”, which is
how he characterised the imposition of
hefty tariffs on imported washing ma-
chines and solar panels. He says that this
will save American solar-cell manufactur-
ers, though there are not many of those. Ac-
cording to a trade group, the solar tariffs
could lead to the industry having 23,000
fewer jobs in America. His insistence that
trade deals should be “fair” and “recipro-
cal” reflects his mercantilist belief that ex-
porting is winning and importing is losing:
all bilateral trade must balance to be “fair”.
Once again Mr Trump urged Congress
to “produce a bill that generates at least
$1.5trn for the new infrastructure invest-
ment we need”. What this means in prac-
tice—what new infrastructure Mr Trump
wants, where the money will come from
or how a congressional bill “generates”,
rather than appropriates, funds—is any-
one’s guess. Equally unclear is why spend-The 45th presidentMillerlight
WASHINGTON, DC
Donald Trump has an immigration proposal to sellUnited States
Also in this section30 The original DREAMer
31 GOP v FBI
31 Protecting human rights
32 Earthquake preparedness
33 Oklahoma’s schools
34 Lexington: The last of the moderates