GROUNDHOG DAY IN THE WHITE HOUSE
How Donald Trump echoes three of his predecessors
John F Kennedy (president from from 1961–63)
As president, John F Kennedy relied heavily on his family – and so does Donald Trump. Trump made his daughter Ivanka and son-in-law Jared Kushner key aides; JFK’s brother Robert was attorney general and his most influential adviser. Both men’s notoriously turbulent private lives have generated a blizzard of headlines – though, in Kennedy’s case, those wouldn’t appear until after his death. Both authorised substantial military build-ups and supported large tax cuts.
Richard Nixon (1969–74)
Nixon believed himself to be under siege from the press – much as Trump does now. Trump uses Twitter to attack journalists, while Nixon instructed his vice president, Spiro Agnew, to give speeches criticising the media. Against the backdrop of the social upheavals of the 1960s, Nixon called for “law and order” to win support from what he called the “great silent majority” of Americans. As protests swept through America following the police killing of George Floyd, Trump tweeted: “LAW & ORDER!” He may well make that a key part of his 2020 presidential campaign.
Ronald Reagan (1981–89)
Reagan cut taxes, bolstered military spending and massively increased the national debt. The similarities between him and Trump don’t end there. Both men were well known to millions of Americans before they entered the White House: Trump as the host of the TV show The Apprentice, while Reagan had also been in show business as a Hollywood actor. One other factor in common is their ability to win support from working-class Americans who traditionally voted for the Democratic Party (known as Reagan Democrats in the 1980s). This was a crucial factor in Trump’s victory in the 2016 election.