President-elect Donald Trump, center left, takes the oath of office during the 60th Presidential Inauguration in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025. (Kenny Holston/The New York Times via AP, Pool)
All the inaugurals I’ve covered (Clinton 1993, Obama 2009) always had a basic theme of unity that brought our country together. Everyone knew the feel-good bipartisan rhetoric wouldn’t last, but for a day, there was a sense of an America united in common purpose.
The Trump inaugural turned all that on its head, paying lip service to unity for a split second then quickly pivoting to campaign mode to remake democracy to Trump’s liking.
What’s that look like?
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A justification of course, to change course because America is as Trump sees it on the “decline.” (It’s not, otherwise how could Trump make $56 billion on his new crypto meme coin over the weekend?) Still, it set up Trump’s message that his life “was saved by God to make America great again.”
Nothing like a messianic subtext to give it an “above it all” tone.
Data released by the BSP on Tuesday showed the public sector’s foreign borrowings from July to September this year went up by 36 percent from the $2.81 billion in the same period last year.
The federal and state governments’ tax revenue reached a total of 86.2 billion euros ($93.54 billion) last month, according to the ministry’s monthly report.
The inaugural address was more like a State of the Union/MAGA laundry list, the same old same old from closing the border to “drill baby drill.”
ADVERTISEMENTHe said he’d do away with policies dealing with addressing climate change, cut taxes and extend tariffs to foreignn entities through an “external revenue service.” Get it? Not an “internal” revenue, external as in tax the outsiders. He didn’t mention how that would cause inflation.
Trump also didn’t mention controversial topics like mass deportation or birth right citizenship at that point. But he did say he’d get “race and gender out of public life, including a standard policy of America is colorblind and merit based.”
That’s startling since he just nominated a number of unqualified people like Pete Hegseth to head up the Department of Defense, and Kash Patel to head the FBI.
ADVERTISEMENTThat made it a speech of contradictions, most notably when he talked about bringing back “law and order.”
A convicted felon talking about law and order? George Orwell wrote “1984,” but it could have been titled “2025.”
Demonstrators protest President-elect Donald Trump’s incoming administration during the People’s March, Saturday, Jan. 18, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana) (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
My ears didn’t really perk up until he said America was going to dream big again and “plant the stars and stripes on Mars!”
Mars? Is that where he wants to deport the undocumented? Let them be Martians?
Or will Mars become the elite’s resort of choice. The Red Planet to match you Red MAGA hat.
Mars was a shout-out to Elon Musk no doubt, who is aiming for lucrative government contracts to fund his dream. That’s the oligarchy’s idea of public-private partnership. Enriching their dreams first. It’s their “Golden Age.”
And what if you really just voted for Trump because of the price of eggs? Elon and friends hope you’ll enjoy the ride in their new democracy.
Still, the inaugural speech was all Trump on script. And on relatively good behavior.
After, he talked to the overflow crowd in another part of the Capitol where VIPs like the governor of Texas and others had to sit and watch large TVs.
Before them, Trump was off good behavior. He criticized Nancy Pelosi, Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden. And then he repeated his biggest lie—that the 2020 election was rigged.
Even after winning, a lack of grace from the new president.
Musk’s Hitlerian salute
But of all the speeches I watched, here’s the lasting image for me that will give you chills.
CONTRIBUTED
While Trump had lunch making nice with the oligarchs and elites in the Capitol, Elon Musk was sent out to the Capital One Arena where some 20,000 non-elite MAGA-types sat awaiting an “indoor” inaugural parade.
It was practically a shadow event with Musk, the tycoon Trump’s “First Buddy,” the oligarch of oligarchs, showing off an unusual exuberance, but almost like acting like a shadow president.
As he said that he made a gesture that looked like a Hitlerian salute from the man seen as the “shadow president.”
“This is what victory feels like,” said Musk to a thunderous applause. “This was a fork in the road of human civilization.”
To even more cheers.
It was not some accidental knee jerk thing. It was for real. And it’s what’s coming if the people, those of you who aren’t red-meat MAGA-types, don’t stay vigilant. Only 49.8 percent voted for Trump. His approval ratings are still at 46 percent, with a disapproval rating of 48 percent.
Trump only has a majority among the high-tech billionaires, who were all there (Meta’s Zuckerberg, Amazon’s Bezos, Google’s Sundar Pichai, Apple’s Tim Cook, Open AI’s Sam Altman). All were with the Democrats four years ago. This year? They are all following the money, as the private sector/public sector double-dippers who control all the cutting edge technologies that will determine the future.
Guests including Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, Sundar Pichai and Elon Musk, arrive before the 60th Presidential Inauguration in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson, Pool)
With all the tech folks involved, some see Trump’s new term as America in startup mode. Cutting costs to make government efficient.
But Trump and the tech bros need to know the algorithm in government is different. Government is not business, nor should it be run like one.
The priority in business is profit. The priority in government is the people. Not some of the people. Not just the rich. All of the people. Even those who didn’t vote MAGA.
If you were in DC, you were cheering the inaugural.
If you were watching on cable, your reaction would be more patriotic and truthful if you threw things at your TV.
The executive orders and birthright citizenship
Trump’s appearance at the arena made it clear the inaugural was just one continuous Trump rally.
After some marching bands, Trump brought on the families of Israeli hostages to continuous applause. Great. But they were exploited as if Trump was the only reason why they were free.
It was just the warmup of what was to come. Trump signed executive orders that wholesale undid 78 Biden executive orders to cheers.
He also put a freeze on hiring, and on regulations. One order called for a return of federal workers to full-time in-person work, which he signed as the crowd cheered.
Most controversial there was the withdrawal from Paris Climate treaty which Trump said would save the US a trillion dollars. But it abdicates leadership on the issue and hastens the doom of our planet. The LA fires didn’t teach us a thing.
Some other orders were frivolous or unnecessary. One of free speech? An end to weaponization of government?
Trump signed them then flipped pens into the crowd of adoring fans.
But the big ones he saved for the Oval Office.
He said he was signing pardons for the J6 “hostages,” aka the insurrectionists, that he would pardon or commute. Based on their violence toward police. We’ll have to see the details. Make no mistake, those convicted for the Jan. 6 insurrection are criminals. But the new felon-in-chief knows how to please his base; 1,500 people are to be pardoned and released, with six with sentence commutations, said Trump. Some may even be released in time to take in an inaugural ball. Maybe to see Snoop Dog?
Demonstrators protest President-elect Donald Trump’s incoming administration during the People’s March, Saturday, Jan. 18, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana) (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
I want to see the details of the immigration orders and the state of emergency at the southern border that would permit the military to go in and shut it down.
But the major thing is Trump is calling for the end of birthright citizenship in America.
For all the respect paid to the Constitution and the peaceful transfer of power, this one thing would tear apart the Constitution.
For 130 years, the Supreme Court has held that an infant born on American soil was an American citizen and “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” in the 14th Amendment.
Trump changing the law by executive order would be illegal without a Constitutional Convention. But Trump is redefining the phrase “birth right citizenship to exclude babies born to parents illegally in the country.
That would immediately undo the legal status of countless US citizens. Was your mother a visa overstay when she had you as a baby in America? You just lost your citizenship.
If that’s the case, with the stroke of a pen on Monday, I know young children who are no longer legal citizens.
This is just the beginning, but an example of Trump’s idea of unity.
It’s an inaugural of new divisions, new walls, new borders. More chaos.
And on Tuesday, the mass deportations are expected to begin early in the morning.
This is why the political fight continues still in a 50/50 America.
Trump got his say on inauguration day.
But in a democracy, he doesn’t get the last word.
Emil Guillermo is an award-winning journalist, commentator, and storyteller. He’s written a weekly “Amok” column on Asian American issues since 1995.
Watch his micro-talk show “Emil Amok’s Takeout/What Does an Asian American Think?” on www.YouTube.com/emilamok1 Or join him on http://www.patreon.com/emilamok
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