Donald J Trump completes 100 days in office—a benchmark imposed by history—this week.
Trump has enshrined uncertainty in global discourse. In a blitzkrieg of actions—executive orders, declarations of emergency and a flurry of directives—the US president has wedged the world between incertitude and vicissitude, between chaos and the promise of a new order.
The cosy comfort of the status quo of the past decades is unravelling—within the US and world over. Global trade is in suspended animation following his yo-yo on tariffs, the imposition and the 90-day pause. In its recent forecast, the IMF has trimmed global growth to sub-3 percent and warned of worse if uncertainty persists.
Stock indices tanked and rallied, but the benchmark S&P 500 trailed its highs by over 500 points and investors lost billions the world over. Barring Warren Buffet, each of the top 10 on Bloomberg Billionaires Index lost money. Mood music in America’s consumption corridors—University of Michigan’s consumer sentiment survey—is at a nervous 52, way below the December level of 74. Public opinion is split, with less than half of US voters approving of Trump’s performance.
And yes, the price of eggs is higher.
Trump is not the apprentice he seemed to be in 2016. He arrived with executive smarts and a submissive legislative party. As Speaker Mike Johnson observed, “Everybody wants to be on this train, and not in front of it.” Unconstrained by convention, DJT issued 139 executive orders and deployed national emergency powers.
Definitions matter.
While 12 states have gone to court, a study by Brennan Center shows Trump can access 137 laws to propel his agenda and that standby powers do not expressly require a declaration of war.
The US president is unruffled. He has declared a national emergency on energy for exploration, refining, production and generation capacity.
Invocation of the Alien Enemies Act has had a chilling effect on migration. Use of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act for imposing tariffs on most countries and an island of penguins has upended global supply chains. Unsurprisingly, corporate America is either lowering guidance or ditching them altogether as companies pull back investments.
The response to his actions is, predictably, binary. Trump is doing everything he said he would. Indeed, he recently observed in an interview, “What I’m doing is exactly what I’ve campaigned on.”
That has not muffled the gasps or dampened the shocks.
To paraphrase Daniel Kahneman, the ability to predict the future trajectory of Trump 2.0 is undermined by the ease with which the navigation of Trump 1.0 is explained.
Of course, not everything has panned out as he promised.
On the campaign trail, he claimed he would end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. It is now 97 days. Russia has rejected his peace proposal, which his friend Boris Johnson trashed this week. Meanwhile, Russia continues to bomb Kyiv, forcing him to post “Vladimir, STOP!” on his Truth Social platform.
Peace in Gaza is elusive as he urges Israel to allow more humanitarian aid into the devastated strip. Greenland has rebuffed the Trumpian idea. On Canada, Trump told Time magazine that he is “not trolling. I say the only way this thing really works is for Canada to become a state.” The assertion helped Liberals led by Mark Carney ahead of the Conservatives in the ongoing campaign.
The tariffs plan itself is wobbling astride whims and worries. The imagery is less reflective of the art of the deal and more about the art of the spiel—about bombastic claims.
Yes, there is talk about deals with India, Japan and Korea—these are most likely agreements of understanding as Bessent puts it, which is a euphemism for agreeing to meet again. The theme of encircling China is sputtering. China has warned its trading partners and countries are wary of the costs of choosing between the two largest economies.
The US-China standoff is verily a ping-pong of claims and denials. Trump said he talked with Xi about tariffs; China denied the talks took place. The truth may well be between the assertion and denial. On Tuesday, Trump told reporters in the Oval Office that tariffs on China will “come down substantially.” This could be interpreted as the olive branch and/or a response to warnings by big-box retailers such as Walmart that high tariffs could result in higher prices and empty shelves.
Trump is at the intersection of dilemmas. The reality of import dependence and tempestuous markets is challenging his gambit.
Trump does care about the economy and the markets, but make no mistake, Trump 2.0 is about geopolitics.
This is manifest in his desire to acquire Greenland, reiteration of Canada as the 51st State, vacating Gaza, the push for mineral rights in Ukraine and the takeover of the Panama Canal.
The sensitivity about markets is visible in some of the pivots—for instance, on sacking US Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, apparently on the advice of Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who is now seen by many as ‘the voice’.
There is no guarantee, however, that Bessent will be heard the next time. Or that Trump will temper his belief of tariffs as the weapon for a geopolitical reset.
In his inaugural address, Trump underlined his quest for a legacy. He said the US will once again consider itself as a growing nation that increases its wealth and “expands our territory.”
The old trope—‘should he be taken literally or seriously’—followed him into office. Trump wants to be taken both literally and seriously. Events will determine if the world agrees.
Shankkar Aiyar
Author of The Gated Republic, Aadhaar: A Biometric History of India’s 12 Digit Revolution, and Accidental India
(shankkar.aiyar@gmail.com)