Trump’s second 100 days

OPINION:

President Trump’s first 100 days of his second term must be regarded as an overall success, with few exceptions, such as his tariff war and nuclear negotiations with Iran. With the Department of Government Efficiency saving taxpayers hundreds of billions of dollars, reductions in illegal immigrants crossing into the U.S., and the overthrow of President Biden’s foreign policy and economy-strangling regulations, Mr. Trump has done very well.

His decision to terminate funding for National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting System shows his determination to keep up the pace of reforms.

Nevertheless, Mr. Trump’s second 100 days, which end Aug. 7, will determine whether his second term is successful.

In his first 100 days, Mr. Trump governed mostly through executive orders and by canceling government programs, some of which have been challenged in court. Now, he must obtain Congress’ cooperation to do more.

The first and most important gauge of success will be the annual budget and budget reconciliation bills. The president has called reconciliation a “big, beautiful bill,” but it’s really two bills.

Mr. Trump’s proposed budget requests cuts of $163 billion in several agencies’ appropriations, a nearly $1 trillion defense budget and $175 billion for border security. The proposed Pentagon budget funds the U.S. equivalent of Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense, shipbuilding and 3.8% pay raise for the military.

Several senators have criticized the budget for doing too little for defense, citing the large amount of Pentagon money that will go to the Department of Energy for modernizing our nuclear arsenal.

More important is that the president’s budget does nothing for Air Force modernization. Our Air Force is too small, too old in terms of aircraft and too unready to fight. Every large or small operation requires Air Force participation. It’s the only indispensable service, and it needs tens of billions of dollars to modernize. The effectiveness of our deterrence strategy compels Air Force modernization.

The reconciliation bill will reportedly include a renewal of Mr. Trump’s tax cuts and perhaps a reduction in Medicaid and will settle other questions of agencies’ funding. Republican disunity in both houses of Congress threatens the bill.

Budget reconciliation is the quickest way to make necessary changes because it is filibuster-proof and can pass the Senate with a simple majority vote.

The budget reconciliation bill always has bits and pieces of substantive legislation tied to budget matters. Because Senate rules prohibit substantive legislation in budget bills, the Senate’s parliamentarian has the authority to weed out the substantive legislation from budget matters.

The parliamentarian decides how much substantive legislation, tied closely enough to budgetary matters, will survive that review.

The second big gauge of Mr. Trump’s success will be his negotiations with Iran on a new nuclear weapons deal. In this case, success will be failure. The Iranians reportedly want a guarantee that no future president can cancel the agreement, which means a treaty ratified by the Senate. Even if Mr. Trump gets what he believes is a good deal, we know that Iran will never surrender its nuclear weapons program peacefully. The Senate should and probably will turn down any treaty in the ratification process.

The third gauge will be the Supreme Court rulings on Mr. Trump’s policy agenda. The court will have to rule on the deportation of illegal aliens, an end to birthright citizenship for children of illegal aliens, and the elimination of diversity, equity and inclusion agendas in federal agencies. Mr. Trump will win some, such as ending birthright citizenship for children of illegal aliens, and lose others.

The fourth gauge will be the president’s promise to rid the Defense Department of the Biden-era woke agenda. During the campaign, Mr. Trump promised to establish a board of high-ranking officers to determine, on a case-by-case basis, the adherence of generals and admirals to the wokeness that burdened the services with readiness and capability shortfalls and resulted in recruitment deficiencies. Neither the president nor Defense Secretary Hegseth has undertaken to accomplish that. Still, the only concerns a commander should have are the lethality and readiness of the force.

A fifth gauge, which by no means completes the list, will be Mr. Trump’s efforts to obtain the release of Edan Alexander, who is the last U.S. hostage of Hamas believed to be alive. He was taken on Oct. 7, 2023. Mr. Alexander is a citizen of the U.S. and Israel. Mr. Trump is Israel’s best friend, perhaps ever, in the White House, but he needs to get Mr. Alexander and the other Israeli hostages released.

Whether Mr. Trump will succeed depends greatly on Republican unity in the House and Senate. Good luck, Mr. President. You’re going to need it.

• Jed Babbin is a national security and foreign affairs columnist for The Washington Times and a contributing editor for The American Spectator.