Trump laid out a vision for America in his inaugural address 4 years ago. He has come nowhere near realizing it.
- President Trump promised Americans good jobs and a return to greatness on the world stage when he made his inaugural address on January 20, 2017.
- Four years later, the speech hasn't aged well, as Trump has largely failed to come anywhere close to accomplishing his goals.
- Trump will leave office with more Americans out of work than when he started and with the US's international reputation damaged.
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On January 20, 2017, a newly-inaugurated President Donald Trump gave a rousing address promising to return power in America to the people and restore the country's greatness on the world stage.
He also painted a picture of an America where citizens are united through patriotism, and the country is seen as a shining example to the world.
Four years on, none of these visions have been realized. Some of his own actions even subverted those goals.
Here are some key quotes from Trump's inaugural address, and why they haven't aged well.
At his inauguration, Trump said Americans 'want great schools for their children, safe neighborhoods for their families, and good jobs for themselves'
"These are the just and reasonable demands of a righteous public," he continued.
But he has done little to make sure Americans got this.
The quality of American public education has been on the decline for years, but instead of tackling the issue, Trump installed perhaps the most controversial education secretary in history, Betsy DeVos.
DeVos spent most of her time in office not improving public-school education, but working to give more Americans the option to educate their children in alternative schools, reduce funding for public schools, and roll back Obama-era guidelines for protecting LGBTQ and minority students.
As for safe neighborhoods, crime has already been on the decline across the US since the 1990s. But since Trump took office, there have been worrying spikes in homicide in cities, especially since the coronavirus pandemic.
The Council on Criminal Justice found that homicides increased 42% last summer in 29 cities, compared to summer 2019.
Trump has blamed Democratic mayors for the violence. But the BBC pointed out that some of the fastest increases in murder rates have been in Republican-controlled cities like Lexington, Kentucky (84.6% increase over 2019), and Omaha, Nebraska (88.9% over 2019).
The quality of American jobs don't appear to be getting any better either.
A study by the Brookings Institution in November 2019 estimated that 44% of Americans were working low-wage jobs with median annual earnings of around $18,000. The analysis found that there simply weren't enough "good jobs," which the think tank defined as jobs that pay median earnings or more for a metropolitan area and provide health insurance.
It's worth noting that the Brookings report was published before the COVID-19 pandemic, which forced millions more Americans out of the work force.
'We will bring back our jobs. We will bring back our borders. We will bring back our wealth ... We will get our people off welfare and back to work'
While the economy grew steadily during most of Trump's time in office, the COVID-19 pandemic wiped away pretty much all of those gains.
During his first campaign, Trump promised to create 25 million jobs, but he's set to leave office with 4.6 million fewer jobs than he started out with, according to The Balance.
He also never really came close to the 25 million job creations, having accomplished just 6.6 million before the pandemic hit, The Balance reported.
Trump will also leave the White House with almost 300,000 more people on the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program as when he became president, according to July 2020 data from the US Department of Agriculture, the most recent one available.
John Sommers II/Getty Images
As for borders, Trump promised to build a 1,000-mile wall spanning the US-Mexico border, but only completed 453 miles. President-elect Joe Biden has also promised to end the project as soon as he is sworn in.
Additionally, work on half-finished sections of the wall in some places made border security worse, as Insider's Mia Jankowicz reported.
'We will seek friendship and goodwill with nations of the world ... We will reinforce old alliances and form new ones'
Trump's "America First" ideology has made the US more isolationist during his four years in office. During his term, Trump pulled the US out of international agreements like the Paris Agreement and the Iran nuclear deal, threatened to cut funding to NATO, and ramped up tensions with China through a trade war.
He started and attempted to foster a diplomatic relationship with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un - becoming the first sitting US president to meet the country's leader in the process - in a bid to get it to denuclearize. But that relationship has ultimately gone nowhere, with Kim plowing on with his nuclear ambitions.
Trump's administration also flared tensions in the Arab world by moving the US Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, a city disputed by Palestinians.
Evan Vucci/AP Photo
The US also lost control of the COVID-19 pandemic under Trump, who ignored science and his own advisors as the virus struck. As most of the world locked down to control the spread of the coronavirus, Trump pushed for businesses to reopen and restrictions to lift.
To date it has recorded more than 24 million coronavirus cases and 400,000 deaths, making it the world's worst-affected country by a substantial margin.
The January 6 Capitol breach also made headlines across the world, eliciting shock from allies and glee from adversaries.
UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who had previously been a staunch supporter of Trump, said the riot was "disgraceful."
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, meanwhile, said the breach "proved Western democracy lacks the proper assets" and that Trump "has damaged America's reputation."
Trump promised to 'unite the civilized world against radical Islamic terrorism, which we will eradicate completely from the face of the Earth'
Trump can take credit for the assassination of Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in October 2019, and it is considered one of his biggest accomplishments in office.
However, the president's repeated claims that ISIS has been totally defeated are false. In August, a United Nations report estimated that there were more than 10,000 fighters left, moving freely between small cells in Iraq and Syria.
'Through our loyalty to our country, we will rediscover our loyalty to each other'
"We must speak our minds openly, debate our disagreements honestly, but always pursue solidarity," Trump continued in his inaugural speech.
Trump's four years in office have seen the US become even more divided, and is perhaps best illustrated by the January 6 riot, where thousands of Trump supporters who refused to accept the results of the 2020 election stormed the Capitol.
Pew Research Center wrote in November 2020 that Americans "have rarely been as polarized as they are today," citing several studies it had conducted over the past few years.
Trump's presidency appears to have stopped political discourse completely for some people too.
A 2020 Pew study found that nearly half of Americans had stopped talking to someone about politics. Another Pew study from 2019 showed that 55% of Americans said they would feel at least somewhat uncomfortable talking about Trump with someone they don't know well.
There have also been multiple stories about families being torn apart due to politics in the Trump era.
'Whether we are Black or brown or white, we all bleed the same red blood of patriots'
Trump said this in 2017, but has over the course of his presidency exhibited a stronger allegiance to white Americans - who make up his base - over Americans of color.
Take, for example, his apparent support for the white nationalists in the 2017 Charlottesville protests. When white supremacists clashed with counterprotesters - even killing one - Trump said there were "very fine people" on both sides.
One of Trump's first actions in office was also to institute the so-called "Muslim travel ban," an order barring people from several Muslim-majority nations from traveling to the US. While many criticized the executive order as racist and Islamaphobic, the administration maintained it was necessary for national-security reasons.
Race relations between Black and white Americans also hit a new low last summer with the police killing of George Floyd.
Floyd's death kicked off a new wave of Black Lives Matter protests across the country, and Trump responded by calling the protesters "anarchists" and "thugs," and dispatching federal agents to face off with protesters in several cities.
When activists painted a large mural spelling Black Lives Matter out on the street in front of Trump's building in New York City, he called it a "symbol of hate."
Lindsey Wasson/Reuters
President-elect Joe Biden is set to take the reins from Trump on Wednesday and give his own inaugural address.
According to CNN, it's a speech the former vice president has been crafting since he gave his victory address in November.
Aides told CNN that the speech is expected to be 20 minutes in length and will address some of the same themes from his November 7 address, in which he implored Americans to "put away the harsh rhetoric" and "give each other a chance."
You can read Trump's 2017 inauguration speech here»
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