Saying he knew what ailed America and often governing by executive order, President Donald Trump dismantled and disrupted pacts and agreements, overhauled the nation’s (three) decades-old tax code, and the help of Republican Senates, reshaped the judiciary.

Even hardcore Trump supporters acknowledge how his own actions have tarnished his legacy. The numbers on his popularity (or unpopularity) posted by FiveThirtyEight and RealClear Politics look abysmal. According to Pew Research, Trump's left the office with the lowest-ever job mark. It said, more than two-thirds of the country does not want him to remain in politics.

His successor has started undoing most of his actions, despite that federal courts will continue to endure his legacy, influencing every aspect of American life for decades. In the four-year he served as a President, he installed two Supreme Court judges and 187 federal bench judges for lifetime appointments. To put this into perspective, the former President Barack Obama appointed 50 judges on 13 US circuit courts in his two terms as the President.

And while this achievement isn’t all that momentous, every administration has their concrete achievements. In Trump’s case, they got lost in the noise he created on Twitter.

We have listed four such achievements that prove this business manganate could have made something out of the four years he spent watching TV in the White House.

First Step Act

First Step Act is the most significant criminal justice reform legislation in years. The act reformed sentencing laws that wrongly and disproportionately harmed the African-American community. It gives non-violent offenders a chance to re-enter the society as productive, law-abiding citizens, Donald Trump had said when the Senate passed the law with a bipartisan majority.

The law enjoyed the support of 42 organizations, including faith-based groups and both left and right conservative think tanks. Brennan Center for Justice, a nonpartisan law and policy institute called the measure “a major win for the movement to end mass incarceration.”

“The First Step Act is a critical win in the fight to reduce mass incarceration. While the bill is hardly a panacea, it’s the largest step the federal government has taken to reduce the number of people in federal custody,” it said.

2. Defeating ISIS Caliphate

ISIS took over a large area of Iraq and Syria and declared a caliphate in 2014. The territory provided a major base of operations to conduct attacks across the world.

Soon after, the Obama administration launched an international coalition to destroy the redoubt of Islamic State in 2014. Trump continued the campaign and in 2019, in raid killed the ISIS commander Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

Until that time, Baghdadi was the world’s most wanted terrorist, and his death was a major blow to the terrorist group. After his demise, Trump had said: “capturing or killing him has been the top national security priority of my administration.”

3. Safeguarding 5G network from Chinese control

We are not in favour of Trump’s trade policy, but Trump’s campaign of building 5G network on Western rather than Chinese technology was a powerful decision. The reason was simple: To secure communications in democratic countries from Chinese surveillance and sabotage through Huawei.

Both current and former Department of Homeland Security cybersecurity official had told Wall Street Journal, Huawei’s structure, its close ties to the Chinese government and role as a supplier of key hardware in telecommunications makes the company a potential tool for espionage and thus a security threat. As a Chinese company, “it has no choice but to comply with the demands of the Chinese Communist Party.”

The DHS cybersecurity official acknowledged that while Huawei might be able to push back against Beijing’s demands, but only to a point. “Huawei has a profit incentive to act in good faith,” the official said, “but the party will get what they want.”

In 2018, Australia banned Huawei from its 5G networks, Canada and Singapore followed suit in 2020. The United Kingdom ordered the removal of Huawei, and France barred the Chinese telecom firm the same month. Even Germany tightened its review of the security risks Huawei posed.

4. A Space Force

Trump announced a Space Force as the sixth branch of armed forces in 2018, citing the country’s increasing need to protect its militaria space technology from foreign threats and preserve “American superiority in the space.”

“This is not a farce. This is nationally critical,” Gen. John Raymond, who Trump tapped to lead the Space Force, told reporters. “We are elevating space commensurate with its importance to our national security and the security of our allies and partners.”

The new branch is a centralized version of military missions in space that already existed from the Air Force, Army, and Navy.

Todd Harrison, who directs the Aerospace Security Project at the Center for Strategic & International Studies, told NPR: “It will create a centralized, unified chain of command that is responsible for space, because ultimately when responsibility is fragmented, no one’s responsible.”

Russia and China already had their versions of a Space Force. In 2015, Russia combined their Air Force, Aerospace and Missile Defense force with the team that managed satellites associated with tracking and control networks to create a Russian Aerospace Force. The same year, China reorganization its military structures to create a PLA strategic support force that brought its electronic network, cyber, and space warfare forces together.

(Edited by : Abhishek Jha)

First Published:Jan 22, 2021 1:24 PM IST