In Trump's raj, will son-in-law also rise?

While the new hardline nominee for US national security adviser, Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, had welcomed Donald Trump’s victory by suggesting that “we just went through a revolution” might be a hyperbole, America is living through one of its great moments of change. What this change might mean for the country and the world will become clear in stages, but the omens are hardly encouraging. President-elect Trump has made several hawkish key-level appointments as he gathers his Cabinet even as anti-Trump demonstrations were staged in US cities for several days running. And in a dramatic turn, vice-president-elect Mike Pence was greeted by the cast of the long-running Broadway hit Hamilton at the end of the show he attended with a message read out from the stage. It proclaimed: “We, Sir, are the diverse America who are alarmed and anxious that your new administration will not protect us, our planet, our children, our parents, or defend us and uphold our inalienable rights”.

For his part, Mr Trump gave a morsel of solace to fearful liberals by inviting one of his fiercest critics in the Republican Party during the campaign, Mitt Romney, for a meeting. It lasted 80 minutes and the latter described it as a “far-reaching conversation with regards to various theatres in the world”. For the President-elect, the talks “went great”. In the election campaign, Mr Romney had called the ultimate victor “a fraud”.

There is no mistaking Mr Trump’s hardline agenda, judging by some of his key appointments. Senator Jeff Sessions, the attorney-general nominee, was rejected from becoming a federal judge in 1986 by his alleged racist inclinations. Lt. Gen. Flynn was turfed out of the Defence Intelligence Agency in 2014. He believes the US is losing the global war against Islamic extremism that might last generations. Mike Pampeo, the CIA director nominee, is a three-term Tea Party hardline Republican and was vehemently opposed to President Barack Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran and has opposed closing the Guantanamo Bay prison.
The chief of staff nominee, Reince Priebus, was chairman of the National Republican Committee and, like the President-elect, has never held public office. But above them all is Mr Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, an orthodox Jew who has the President-elect’s ear in the familiar Indian family-friendly political tradition. Unlike his father-in-law, he is soft-spoken and was responsible for major decisions during the running of the campaign.

As an aside, Mr Trump has settled a lawsuit from former students of the dodgy Trump University. They said they were cheated. The President-elect’s plea in throwing money ($25 million) to settle the claim he had earlier refused to do was that he was too busy, tasked as he was in running the country.

Understandably, there is much world interest in how the new administration, once it assumes office next January, will reorder relations far and wide. Opposition to the proposed Trans-Pacific trade deal is a given. Speculation in particular surrounds relations with Russia. Mr Trump’s admiration for President Vladimir Putin is well advertised and the latter greeted the unlikely Republican nominee’s victory with the hope that relations would improve. Lt. Gen. Flynn shares his future boss’ desire to reset the agenda on Russia, one area that would bring a measure of hope for the world.

The recent meeting of Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe with Mr Trump, the first foreign leader to meet him, publicly yielded the usual signs of mutual satisfaction. Yet during the campaign, Mr Trump had suggested that countries such as Japan and South Korea build their own nuclear weapons or should pay the US vastly more to protect their security. Lt. Gen. Flynn sat in on the meeting with Mr Abe.

In general, President-elect Trump’s approach to China and Asia is far from clear. During the campaign he lashed out against China and India stealing American jobs but his future administration’s views on Beijing’s extravagant claims in the South and East China Seas, struck down by The Hague international court, remain unclear. For his part, President Xi Jinping has expressed his desire for an early meeting with the new President. Beijing, meanwhile, has been courting neighbours Philippines and Malaysia. Mr Trump has expressed goodwill towards India and was fraternising with an American Hindi outfit. What it amounts to in practice remains to be seen.

Campaign rhetoric is one thing and the task of governing the leading world power quite another. The Romney gesture is an indication that Mr Trump is learning on the job. But he will be conscious of the feelings of his supporters who brought him to power. The nature of the team he has collected thus far speaks for itself even as it leaves many questions unanswered. Will he build a wall along the Mexican border? On immigration, he has limited himself to deporting two to three million Mexican illegals with a criminal record, instead of the 11 million illegal Mexicans estimated to be living in the US. And he will doubtless make other compromises as he goes along.

Apart from the measures the Trump administration will take in pursuing a more right-wing nationalist line, there are many blanks to be filled in. The President-elect must determine where to draw the line between pandering to the ultra-nationalist slogans and the country’s interests. It is all very well to rail against globalisation for taking away American jobs but the US is at the heart of globalisation and cannot survive by turning its back to an inter-connected world.
Power is a great game changer and Mr Trump’s personality flaws and fondness for women, so apparent during revelations in the election campaign, will perhaps recede to the background as he assumes the presidential mantle. It would, however, be no surprise if he were subjected to snide remarks and parody from a world audience.

In American terms, President Trump’s era will be a new ballgame. The world must wait to discover what its precise contours are with a measure of foreboding.