Speaking Tuesday before an audience of supporters at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, Donald Trump presented an hour-long speech announcing that he is running in the 2024 general election to regain the United States presidency. Trump used the speech to provide an introduction to aspects of the agenda he says he will pursue as president.
The first half of Trump’s speech was largely consumed with talk about other matters including criticism of President Joe Biden, promotion of Trump’s past presidency, discussion of the 2022 midterm election, predictions of particular goals to be accomplished due to undefined actions he would pursue as president, and rhetorical flourishes.
Then, in the second half of the speech, Trump addressed what he termed “just the beginning of our national greatness agenda” that he would seek to implement should he assume the presidency in after the 2024 election.
Below are Trump’s comments from the speech outlining aspects of that presidential or “national greatness” agenda.
Regarding the economy, Trump said “we will build the greatest economy ever” after the Biden administration had “destroyed” the US economy. In particular, Trump said he would take action to reduce inflation to one percent. He also declared, “On day one we will end Joe Biden’s war on American energy.” This Trump argues will reduce inflation because it will reduce energy costs. Along with that, Trump said, “The socialist disaster known as the Green New Deal, which is destroying our country, and the many crippling regulations that it has spawned will be immediately terminated so that our country can again breathe and grow and thrive like it should.”
Because “economic security is national security,” Trump then declared “we will launch an all-out campaign to eliminate America’s dependence on China.” Continuing, Trump stated, “We will bring our supply chains” that he described as “a disaster right now,” as well as manufacturing, “back home” and “systematically bring back wealth, health, and success to the American middle class and to America itself.”
Moving on to the next item in his presidential agenda, Trump declared, “We are going to restore and secure America’s borders just like we had them before — best ever.” Trump, in making this statement, was comparing his record to that of Biden who Trump said “has abolished America’s borders.” Trump spoke of a border wall as a component of achieving his goal. “We built the wall, and now we will add to it,” he stated. Continuing his discussion of immigration and borders, Trump said, “Within moments of my inauguration, catch and release will be gone forever.” He also said he would reinstate a policy where prospective immigrants “remain in Mexico” as the immigration determination process proceeds. In addition, Trump stated, “We will begin the process of safely removing the illegal alien criminals that have been unlawfully allowed into our country.”
“We will stop the flow of deadly drugs and horrible human trafficking which both have been set upon us like never before,” Trump declared, continuing his discussion related to the border while transitioning to the topic of restoring law and order that Trump claims has had a “total breakdown” under Biden’s presidency.
“I will restore public safety in American cities and other communities that need our help, and, if they don’t want our help, we are going to insist that they take our help this time,” Trump declared. In this context, he also mentioned his past use, as president, of the national guard in America.
Regarding police, Trump said, “We will give our police back their authority, resources, power, legal protection, and we will give them back their respect; they’re great people.”
Further, Trump stated he will as president “immediately launch a no-holds-barred national campaign to dismantle the gangs and clean out the nests of organized street crime.”
The next bit of Trump’s speech concerned the war on drugs. Trump began, “We will wage war upon the cartels and stop the fentanyl and deadly drugs from killing 200,000 Americans per year, and I will ask Congress for legislation ensuring” that all people caught selling drugs “receive the death penalty for their heinous acts.”
Shifting to education, Trump stated in the announcement speech, “When I’m in the White House, our schools will cease pushing critical race theory — as they were, radical civics, and gender insanity, or, if they do that, they will lose all federal funding, but we’ll get them to stop.” Trump commented that he “will be the president who finally fixes education in America,” noting, “We will not let men, as an example, participate in women’s sports.” Trump also expressed generally a commitment to defending parental rights.
Moving on to the military, Trump stated, “As commander in chief, I will get Biden’s radical left ideology out of our military.”
Next addressing coronavirus-related policy, Trump declared, “We will abolish every Biden covid mandate and rehire every patriot who was fired from our military with an apology and full back pay.”
Regarding foreign policy, Trump stated, “unlike Biden possibly getting us into World War III, which can seriously happen, I will keep America out of foolish and unnecessary foreign wars just as I did for four straight years.” Continuing, Trump declared, “We will again have peace through strength.” Expanding on this idea, Trump immediately added, “As events overseas have shown, to protect our people from the unthinkable threat of nuclear weapons and hypersonic missiles, the United States must also build a state-of-the-art, next-generation missile defense shield.”
Proceeding on, Trump stated, “We must conduct a top-to-bottom overhaul to clean out the festering rot and corruption of Washington, DC.” Trump followed up with a similar broad statement that “We will dismantle the deep state and restore government by the people.” Providing some indication of how he may seek to accomplish these goals, Trump declared, “To further drain the swamp, I will push for a constitutional amendment to impose term limits on members of Congress.” Continuing, Trump stated he would “ask for a permanent ban on taxpayer funding of campaigns” and “a lifetime ban on lobbying by former members of Congress and Cabinet members.” Also on Trump’s list for banning, he stated in the speech, is “members of Congress getting rich by trading stocks with insider information.”
Lastly, moving on to elections, Trump declared, “To eliminate cheating, I will immediately demand voter ID, same day voting, and only paper ballots.” In addition, Trump stated, “we want all votes counted by election night.”
That’s the first look at Trump’s presidential agenda, from the man himself. We’ll see how the agenda develops over the campaign.
