How Donald Trump Almost Won The US 2020 Elections
Here are the reasons why 250k COVID-19 deaths in the U.S. did not prevent Donald Trump from getting 65million votes from American citizens.
Coming as a shock to many, Donald Trump was able to garner over 70million American votes, which was a record for the Republicans and over 5 million more than his last term.
Many had argued the way COVID-19 pandemic outbreak was handled, with 10mn cases and 250k death’s would cost Trump his re-election. In fact, the Coronavirus Pandemic was one of the main election planks adopted by the incumbent President’s challenger, Joe Biden’s campaign.
So, what went right for Trump?
The answer lies in Money. Unfortunate as it is, the fact is, money is more important to people than human life in the current times that we live in. Approximately 2,50,000 people have died, and the death rate is still rising at a scary pace. Yet, it doesn’t bother people because Trump made them rich.
He slashed personal income Taxes to all-time lows. The top rate fell from 39.6% to 37%, while the 33% bracket dropped to 32%, the 28% bracket to 24%, the 25% bracket to 22%, and the 15% bracket to 12%.The Corporate Tax rate for many industries was also slashed to effectively 21% .
It meant more money in the hands of the corporates, and some of that trickled down to the middle and low-income groups.
Employment, wages and the stock markets were at an all-time high under Donald Trump. Economy was going great until the Pandemic hit. Post the pandemic, a huge section of Americans have received social security checks from a $1.8 trillion stimulus package.
To say it in simple terms, closing and shutting down the economy would have saved lives, but cost ‘Jobs’ and caused great suffering to the poor and middle income groups. The same thing was said in developing countries like India, where people were more bothered about dying of hunger than from the Coronavirus Pandemic.
When Trump pitched opening up the economy, he was correct in assuming that people were willing to risk their lives for their livelihood. The Coronavirus didn’t scare them the same way, the thought of not having money to pay rent or have food on the table did.
Trump is a career businessman, he has dealt with thousands of employees and employee unions. He might not be clever in many policy decisions, but when it comes to economy and money, he knows what works with the masses. It is profit over people in today’s world, and Trump pitched just that, and it worked.
It’s not just in the U.S., but all over the world. The Environment has suffered tremendously in the past century, and more so under Donald Trump. But when it comes to getting elected, environment doesn’t count, food and jobs do.
Democrats are also equally to blame here as they choose not to elect a more young, enthusiastic and a charismatic person to take on Donald Trump. The controversy surrounding Hunter Biden and Joe Biden’s ties with China didn’t help either. A person with a much cleaner and upright image would have helped. They didn’t learn from the loss of 2016. Majority of Democrats interviewed before the elections said they weren’t voting for “Joe Biden” but rather “Against Trump”. It meant they clearly weren’t happy with their choice of democratic candidate.
World hopes Donald Trump will do a better job this time around if he becomes the president and strike a balance between environment and economy. Democracy is not the perfect system as many make it out to be, it needs to evolve further. For that we need patience and a will to accept change.
One good thing which comes out of all this is that Chinese premier Xi Jinping will have sleepless nights for the next four years, and Taiwan and Japan will probably feel safer.
For now it’s, God Bless America and God Bless Trump.