Jan. 20, 2026

Permission to republish original opeds and cartoons granted.

 

 

One Year Later, Trump Has Restored American Strength. It Didn’t Take a Miracle, It Took A President.

By Robert Romano

Sometimes you don’t know how important something was until it is gone. And so it was with President Donald Trump, only the second president in American history to be elected to two non-consecutive terms in 2016 and then in 2024 after being ousted in 2020 during the Covid recession. 

Almost overnight, when former President Joe Biden was elected, the borders were made wide open as 10.8 million illegal aliens poured over the border over the next four years.

The Covid spendathon never ended as Biden returned to Congress for the $1.9 trillion American “Rescue” Plan to boost demand even as production still lagged behind demand from the Covid lockdowns and after we had already printed, spent and borrowed $6 trillion for Covid — too much money chasing too few goods — fueling the inflation nightmare as inflation peaked in June 2022 at 9.1 percent. 

It might take until mid-2027 just to break even from that mess if average weekly earnings and consumer prices continue growing at their current rates of 3.75 percent and 2.7 percent, respectively, an Americans for Limited Government Foundation analysis of Bureau of Labor Statistics data shows. 2027! That’s how bad it was.

In 2022, Biden even tried to get Senate Democrats to abolish the filibuster rule requiring 60 votes to advance legislation in the Senate to pack the Supreme Court, pass the Green New Deal, make Puerto Rico and D.C. states to pack the Senate and render immigration enforcement null and void and pass amnesty for the millions of illegal aliens to pack the Census and thus the House — all of which was narrowly averted by Kirsten Sinema, Joe Manchin and Senate Republicans.

As the incumbents, Biden, Harris and the Democrats suffered, with Biden going underwater in approval just 8 months or so into his term as discontent over the economy, inflation, illegal immigration and Democratic overreach to imprison Trump built up through the 2022 midterms and then the 2024 election that swept Trump back into power, the first Republican to win the national popular vote since the year 2000.

Was 2024 a referendum for Trump or against Democrats? Maybe it was a little bit of both.

One year ago, President Trump took office to finish what he started in 2017, to secure the border, to put America first on trade and to restore America as a great power globally. And on all three counts, he has kept his promises. 

As Trump’s second term began, the President had political capital and he proceeded to use it: declaring national border and trade emergencies, sending the military to the border resulting in a 90 percent decrease in southwest border encounters, declaring drug cartels to be narcoterrorist organizations and targeting them and their state sponsors, instituting reciprocal tariffs to protect national security and encourage producers (especially GPU chip manufacturers) to come back to America to fuel the artificial intelligence revolution, declaring a crime emergency and restoring order to the nation’s capital, Washington, D.C., rolling back Biden-era regulations holding back U.S. energy and electricity production, pushing Congress to make the Trump tax cuts permanent and to institute his campaign promises of no taxes on tips, overtime and Social Security and reforming the U.S. Treasury’s payment systems to better detect waste, fraud and abuse.  Promises made, promises kept. 

President Trump has devoted himself to fighting crime in America’s cities, and now he faces perhaps his greatest challenge yet in somehow persuading blue states to stop being sanctuary states and to instead cooperate with federal immigration enforcement efforts. Minnesota Democratic Gov. Tim Walz has falsely called this a “war” when it is simply restoring federal authority to enforce the nation’s laws. States don’t get to do nullification. We saw how that went in the 1860s. Don’t want to go that way.  

On the foreign stage, President Trump restored U.S. credibility including the credible threat of force, destroying Iran’s nuclear weapons program as Israel faced repeated barrage of missiles from Iran, and yet also offered peace, who with Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the President’s special envoys, ended eight wars including the Israel-Hamas war while successfully negotiating the release of the hostages who had been held in captivity since Oct. 7, 2023, resulting in a 94 percent reduction wartime fatalities in Gaza. 

Even now, the President continues to press for an end to the Russia-Ukraine war, never discouraged even as thousands continue to perish weekly, reminding the world of the need to pull back from the brink of a wider war. There might be no more important accomplishment abroad in the President’s second term than ending that war and averting a wider war with Russia. Keep at it, Mr. President. It’s only a matter of time. 

More locally but also very notably historically, the President has once again asserted U.S. power in the Western Hemisphere, pushing for better U.S. access and control over the Panama Canal and pushing for North American missile defense systems to be put into and over Canada and Greenland — one way or another. 

That’s one of those where politicians and bureaucrats can and will wring their hands, but all will benefit in the long run from peace through strength, geopolitical stability and maintaining the global balance of power. 

Consider the Panama Canal, construction of which occurred in 1904 during the U.S. era of imperialism. We took it over from the French, and in the process connected the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Just think, if the U.S. had not built the canal, we might not have been able to win World War II. Just connecting our navies was that important. 

Well, in Greenland, presently, it might be difficult to see in 2026 why it was important for President Trump to build his missile defense shield over all the skies and space above North America but by 2056, maybe we can just thank him later. These are very well considered projections of U.S. power that might save us all — you just don’t know it yet. 

The fact is the world has always been far safer when America is strong, respected and feared. Freedom isn’t free, but it’s a lot cheaper when you plan ahead — and for the first time in a long time, we have a president who understands that.

2025 was a bumpy ride, as capital markets can attest, initially taking a hit as Wall Street whined about tariffs briefly before hitting fresh new highs throughout the year. The inflation that was predicted on the heels of the tariffs has not come to fruition as the U.S. continues the disinflation that began in 2023. 

That can easily be shown when inflation is compared to household incomes and earnings, a long process that, again, might not fully correct itself until about mid-2027 — almost certainly not in time for Congressional midterms — but is still important to chart the progress of. 

If prices cool faster (flood the markets with food, energy and electricity, Mr. President) or if incomes grow faster in a non-inflationary way, then it can move a bit faster. How fast that goes all boils down to how aggressive the President wants to be. The miracle of the American economy is that on balance, over time and historically, U.S. households get wealthier as wages grow faster than prices. But in politics, you don’t get a lot of time. If we need more imports in certain areas, then go secure the temporary trade deals we need and prices will come down all the faster. It doesn’t have to be permanent, just liking importing eggs wasn’t permanent — we already ate them. Now, inflation all the way down to 2.7 percent. Not too shabby, but there's still a way's to go.

What’s important is we are headed in the right direction. Just stay the course, Mr. President. We’ll get there. 

Just on the southern border alone, the difference a year later is palpable — and provable. More than 2 million illegal aliens a year down to 118,000 since the end of January, according U.S. Customs and Border Patrol data. It didn’t take a miracle. It took a President. Thank you.

Robert Romano is the Executive Director of Americans for Limited Government and Americans for Limited Government Foundation.  

To view online: https://dailytorch.com/2026/01/one-year-later-trump-has-restored-american-strength-it-didnt-take-a-miracle-it-took-a-president/ 

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Video: SEEN FIRSTHAND: Trump's Secure Border Policy Working, As Is USMCA

To view online: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_NfvzSgSRQ 

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A Timely Warning From Virginia

By Bill Wilson

As everyone in the political sphere begins setting their sights on the Congressional midterm elections at the end of the year, a very timely warning to the GOP has already come from Virginia. Yes, we all know the “top lines.” Democrats won all three statewide races and captured 13 seats in the House of Delegates to hand them a level of control – 64 to 36 – they have not held since 1987!

A blowout? Of course, there are no other words for it. But the mechanics of this surge is important to understand. Only an honest appraisal of the disaster can serve Republicans and conservatives this year and beyond.

After reviewing all 13 “flipped” districts, it is crystal clear how the Democrats pulled this off. It had nothing to do with anything other than the basics.

In all 13 districts, the Democrats saw huge increases in voter turnout. While this was obviously helped by the anti-Trump fever suffered by many on the left, it does not explain the patterns that can be seen. By looking at each precinct in the 13 districts, comparing the number of votes for each party in 2023 vs. 2025 and checking registration figures, it becomes plain that a very well organized and planned turnout operation was in place.  

Simply put, the Democrats targeted where their voters were and then worked to turnout as many as they could.  So, while we see Democrat-voting precincts having large increases in the number of voters, a precinct literally next door did not. So, in one district that is split between Democrats and Republicans, the Democrats won the seat by seeing massive turnout in their base in Petersburg City while turnout of the three GOP-leaning counties was flat. Result? A Democrat flip.

The most common element was turnout but in a number of places huge increases in registered voters were also employed. The most apparent case of this was in District 41 where two counties make up the district. The Republican one, Roanoke, saw virtually no increase in registration. But in Democrat Montgomery County there were large increases but only in precincts that historically vote to the left. Again, the result was a Democrat flip.

While all of this was going on from the Democrats, what was the program of the “professional” Republicans? A sad and predictable set of actions. When it comes to turnout, they simply pushed to “get every Republican to vote.” But that overlooks the fact that upwards to half of the voters don’t identify with either of the parties. If you want additional votes you have to go for the “low propensity” voters. That did not happen in Virginia in 2025, even though it is arguably how President Trump succeeded nationwide the year before.

Why? Why did the GOP fail, or more accurately refuse, to engage low propensity voters? The reason is the sad truth is that to do so requires the discussion of issues that the old-line GOP, Inc. crowd does not want raised. Not once did the GOP or their statewide candidate raise the issue of illegal immigrants. Not once did they attack the Democrats’ promise to turn Virginia into another festering sanctuary state, which it already is thanks to Virginia Democratic Gov. Abigail Spanberger’s executive actions taken as soon as she was sworn in. Not once did they use the highly effective issues of Democrat dysfunction during the Biden regime or the insanity that can be viewed in the Democrat-Left strongholds, places like Portland, Oregon or Seattle or virtually any city in California.

They refused and instead fell back on the social issue of the transgender radicals. While most people oppose this and it is true that the Democrat standard bearer and now Gov. Spanberger is very radical on this issue, it is apparently not an issue that moves that many people. While the mainstream media and the propaganda mills want people to think it is a major issue, it is not. Illegal immigration and the harmful impact it is having on American families is. But that is not an agenda item for the “me-too” Republicanism of the people who controlled the Virginia GOP.

The GOP approach was to turnout those they knew were Republican. And they did achieve that.  In most cases the Republican candidate did get as many or a few more votes that what they had gathered in 2023. But, so what? It didn’t win a thing.

So, on all counts — failure to register new voters in specific areas, turnout operations that looked beyond the known GOP and refusal to employ issues that had motivated large numbers of voters in 2024, the Virginia Republican campaign failed miserably. 

And that is the warning to everyone who wants to see the MAGA movement continue to grow and America to flourish in the coming years.

The Democrats in Virginia have given a playbook on how to win and win big. It is not rocket science and it is not “cheating.” It is based on hard work and measurable goals. If the GOP structure will learn from it, 2026 can be another good year of beating the odds. But, if they fall back on their normal grift and pretend approach, then look for a defeat on the scale of 1964 when one of the largest Democrat majorities in modern history took office.  

Bill Wilson is the former president of Americans for Limited Government. 

To view online: https://dailytorch.com/2026/01/a-timely-warning-from-virginia/