Apr 26, 2025 2 min read

In the April 20 op-ed, “Trump’s Unwarranted Harm Against America,” Gary Stout not only predicts the end of America as we know it, but also warns of a looming Trump dictatorship. He breathlessly compares the stock market perturbations of the last two weeks to the market plunges after the 911 attacks and after the COVID outbreak in 2019. But, as in the past, in his zeal to put pen to paper to denigrate the president, Mr. Stout did not bother to consider a couple of key factors that would lend themselves to an objective assessment.

First, he fails to mention that after the two aforementioned stock market plunges, America rebounded quite nicely. While things looked very dicey on Sept. 12, 2001. and in the spring of 2019, time and the resilience of American people and businesses turned things around splendidly. No one knows for sure how Donald Trump’s tariffs and “deals” are going to work out. But the situation is far from over, and American resilience, ingenuity, and resourcefulness will always have a significant say in the matter.

Secondly, Mr. Stout believes the president’s economic actions are designed to pave the way for a dictatorship. He fails to consider that there are legitimate reasons for the current administration’s economic strategy. Our national debt ($37 trillion) is our nation’s Achilles Heel and, left unchecked, it will destroy our economy. Successive administrations – including Trump ’45 – simply added to that debt and hoped they could get out of office before the roof caved in. So, a key thrust of the current aggressive Trump economic approach is to try to rein in that debt by:

– Reducing U.S. trade deficits;

– Seeking fair trade relationships to protect American workers and address trade imbalances;

– Reprioritizing and “on-shoring” U.S. manufacturing;

– Stimulating economic growth and higher wages through tax reform, reduced government spending, and elimination of strangling regulations.

Neither Mr. Stout’s “knowledgeable observers” nor the president’s advocates know how all this will turn out. But just as the nation needed time to adjust after 911 and COVID, so it will need time, clear thinking, and legislative cooperation to adjust to the new administration’s economic efforts. If Trump’s economic policies are successful, they will be good for our country. If those policies fail, then the newspaper’s regular Trump detractors will have plenty of time and grist for “I told you so’s.”

Steve Johnson

Washington