Is Trump Becoming a King?
Is Trump Becoming a King?
Happy Friday!
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz visited Spain yesterday, and Israel was a big subject of discussion. Spain has shown itself to be decidedly anti-Israel, as our feature story this morning shows. Merz openly distanced himself from Spain’s position and came off looking like a true friend of the Jews.
Is Trump becoming a king? Barack Obama stretched the power of America’s presidency in unprecedented ways, enacting executive actions, empowering bureaucrats under his command, and bypassing checks and balances imposed by America’s founders. His devotees cheered, his critics seethed, and legal scholars warned that the nation was becoming something other than a constitutional republic. America truly was under attack from the top.
Now Donald Trump is the one in the Oval Office, and he is fighting a multifront war against years of executive abuses that have been aided and amplified by leftist dominance in government, media and academia. This is requiring aggressive, robust executive action of its own. And while it is checking or reversing many of the most destructive trends of the Obama-Biden era, it is not reining back the power of the presidency and restoring constitutional restraints. Rather it is stretching it even further.
The left is now incessantly accusing President Trump of authoritarianism. Their denunciations are easy to dismiss since these same people enthusiastically endorsed Obama’s abuses of power.
And so many of the Trump administration’s muscular actions are praiseworthy: curbing illegal immigration, promoting law and order, confronting radicalization within higher education, calling out blatant media bias, and so on. Such achievements would simply not be possible within the ossified system of status quo politics.
Yet the side effect is that the U.S. presidency is becoming more like a monarchy.
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For example: Late-night host Jimmy Kimmel said on air that Charlie Kirk’s assassin was maga. A reprehensible lie—and totally in character for the radical left. The fcc threatened to pull abc’s broadcasting license, and abc suspended Kimmel’s show.
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It was an extraordinary instance of 1) a leftist actually facing consequences for deceitfully demonizing his political enemies; and 2) direct government intervention in such a matter. The left is hyperventilating over it.
Principled conservatives pushed back hard against Attorney General Pam Bondi’s threat to use the Justice Department to restrict “hate speech.” Her statements suggested that she is a pragmatist, not a principled conservative. And the reality is, the president tends to fit that description as well.
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Mainstream media coverage is overwhelmingly partisan and anti-Trump. The president has threatened to correct the problem by revoking broadcasting licenses. It is a genuine problem, and what else is he to do?
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His enemies blithely accuse him of operating from a dictator’s playbook and wanting fawning media coverage. The critique is unfair—but, again, this is uncharted territory. Who decides when the government that is exercising such power has overstepped?
A related development occurred yesterday in the Senate, when it voted 51-47 to approve 48 of President Trump’s nominees in a single vote. The mass confirmation was made possible by a Republican-led change in Senate rules—the “nuclear option,” which removes the need for a separate cloture vote on each nominee.
- This convention-busting move was necessitated by Democrat stonewalling and delay in confirming even relatively low-level nominees. It opens the door for Democrats to push radicals into power the next time they hold power in the Senate.
John Adams, America’s second president, famously said, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” Amoral and irreligious radicals have transformed America so much that only the most combative political measures even stand a chance of reversing them. But we are now seeing how these measures are moving the nation further toward an imperial presidency.
Gerald Flurry has described how Donald Trump is fulfilling the role of a prophesied end-time King Jeroboam ii. He has pointed to biblical passages, especially Amos 7, indicating that Trump would exercise considerable authority, even kinglike power. Such scenarios would be difficult to envision in a nation operating under the constraints imposed on the executive by America’s founders. But imagining them is getting easier all the time.
Britain’s future lies with the U.S., not the EU. That’s the main takeaway from President Trump’s trip to the United Kingdom. After events full of pageantry and symbolism, Trump and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer signed a new deal full of substance. The two countries will cooperate in artificial intelligence, nuclear energy and quantum computing, and will recognize each other’s regulatory standards.
“With this deal, the UK is repositioning itself firmly on the American regulatory side on all the important technologies of the 21st century—and away from the EU,” wrote EuroIntelligence. “This is the area of regulation that matters the most for future economic prosperity.”
The Telegraph’s Ambrose Evans-Pritchard wrote that it “comes close to killing off the Rejoiner dream once and for all.” In other words, Brexit is permanent.
EU regulations shut the door on a lot of American AI initiatives. Apple recently unveiled new software that will instantly translate foreign languages. Its new earphones can translate in-person conversations in real time—but not in the EU, due to regulation. It’s a minor example, but Mr. Trump’s new deal will keep such obstacles out of Britain’s relationship with the U.S.
Starmer is pro-EU and has tried to bring Britain as close as he can to rejoining. Yet desperate for economic growth, he has been forced to choose America.
Nearly 10 years ago, Gerald Flurry wrote that, thanks to Brexit, Britain “will be more desperate to trade with the U.S.,” leading to Britain tying itself to America. That is what we have seen this week.
IN OTHER NEWS
Syria to have border deal with Israel “within days”: Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa told media Wednesday that he is negotiating an agreement with Israel to de-escalate the tense security situation at their mutual border “within days.” As other Arab countries distance themselves from Israel, the new Syrian government continues to work with Israel. Bible prophecy foretells that such actions are setting Israel up for a devastating double cross.
German lawmakers think weapons are worth debt. They approved a $595 billion annual budget yesterday, with $165 billion in new debt, much of it for defense and infrastructure. Disputes over spending toppled the previous government in November, leading the legislature to loosen its laws on debt. Germany will struggle to sustain its welfare state, and future budgets will strain the coalition, but most lawmakers agree that a more powerful German military is worth it. That is not the only drastic change coming.
German store owner: “No Jews.” A resident of the German town of Flensburg has been caught with the sign “Jews are forbidden here” on his shop window. In smaller letters, the sign reads: “Nothing personal, not even anti-Semitism, I just can’t stand you.” The shopkeeper, Hans Platen-Reisch, said he did so to protest Israel’s invasion of Gaza. A former mayor of Flensburg filed a report with the police. Though small, this is another sign that Germans’ attitudes to Israel aren’t as rosy as they may appear.
Trump designated Antifa as a domestic terrorist organization on Wednesday after evidence emerged that Charlie Kirk’s assassin was inspired by Antifa ideology. “I will also be strongly recommending that those funding Antifa be thoroughly investigated in accordance with the highest legal standards and practices,” he wrote. It is unclear what legal weight President Trump’s designation will carry since Antifa is a decentralized movement, yet he is absolutely right that Antifa is dangerous. Antifa is actually not a new political force. It is a loosely connected network of groups named in honor of the military wing of the Communist Party of Germany. The movement was founded in the 1920s as part of the Soviet Union’s efforts to transform Germany into a Communist dictatorship. Read our article “Unmasking Antifa” for more information about the movement’s history and potential role in a future American civil war.
McDonald’s to invest $200 million into regenerative agriculture: The fast-food giant, which serves over 90 percent of Americans annually, is going to shift some of its supply chain and commit more than $200 million over the next seven years to promote regenerative grazing practices, habitat restoration, water conservation and wildlife protection across 4 million acres of cattle ranches in up to 38 states. This effort aims to enhance soil health, boost grassland productivity, and support sustainable beef sourcing. This is an unexpected win for the Make America Healthy Again movement.
