Trump's tariffs seek to extend his mandate

President Donald Trump isn’t the first, but his may be the worst.

It’s an oft-repeated pattern in American presidential politics: the reelected president who seeks to extend his electoral mandate — and fails dramatically.

Democratic President Franklin D. Roosevelt did that in 1937, when, buoyed by a 46-state landslide, he sought to add justices to the Supreme Court to ensure more favorable rulings on his New Deal legislation.

Republican President George W. Bush did it when, vowing to spend the "political capital" from his 2004 victory, he proposed revising Social Security to allow workers to put some of their savings into stocks and bonds.

And Trump is doing it at home and abroad as he piles dramatic changes atop dramatic changes — most recently, by upending the international trading order with stiff tariffs on major U.S. trading partners.

Senate Democrats foiled Roosevelt’s "court-packing" plan. A year later, the president suffered dramatic losses in midterm congressional elections: 72 seats in the House, and 8 in the Senate.

Bush’s fellow Republicans ditched his Social Security privatization plan amid fears it would jeopardize retirement savings. With setbacks in Iraq exacerbating his problems, Republicans lost both the House and Senate in the 2006 midterm elections for the first time in 12 years.

Trump’s dramatic tariff increases are designed to counter restrictions by foreign countries on their trade with the United States. They drew initial acquiescence — though with some trepidation — from his fellow Republicans.

But GOP political restiveness is increasing, as Republicans fear the prospect of renewed inflation and see the tariffs being sharply rejected by Trump’s theoretical allies in the business community, sending stock prices hurtling downward from New York to Hong Kong.

The three presidential examples have something else in common besides being undertaken by reelected chief executives seeking to benefit from political tides they believed were flowing from their reelections. Their wounds were all self-inflicted.

Each president sought a dramatic change in national policy, inspired less by political or economic necessities than because he saw a way to burnish his political legacy.

Roosevelt reacted to votes by aging conservative holdovers on the court that invalidated some key first term anti-Depression initiatives, including The Railroad Retirement Act, the National Industrial Recovery Act and the Agricultural Adjustment Act.

Fearing the court might reject the New Deal’s centerpiece, the 1935 Social Security Act, Roosevelt stunned lawmakers by proposing in February 1937 to let a President replace federal judges over 70, including up to six on the Supreme Court.

The Senate rebelled, though 76 of 96 were Democrats, and Roosevelt lost the battle. But he won the war, as the court began to issue more favorable rulings, including upholding Social Security. Within a year, two of his High Court targets had retired.

Still, he never fully recovered politically, though the onset of World War I enabled him to win a third and then a fourth term before he died on April 12, 1945.

Neither Bush nor Trump had Roosevelt’s extensive political support when they sought dramatic policy changes. Both had initially been elected while losing the popular vote.

Bush only won his second term by a single state — Ohio — though he had a popular majority over Sen. John Kerry of 2.4 points.

But the day after the election, he claimed a broader mandate. "The people made it clear what they wanted," he said. "I earned capital in the campaign, political capital, and I intend to spend it."

His proposal to let younger workers divert some payroll tax withholding to private investments was something he had mentioned — but not stressed — in the campaign. There was such a visceral reaction against it that the House Republican majority never seriously considered it.

In seeking dramatic changes in both the federal government and the international trading structure, Trump has three advantages neither predecessor enjoyed.

First, he repeatedly mentioned in campaign speeches he would seek to cut federal spending and increase U.S. tariffs. But those proposals seemed to have lesser priority than deporting immigrants living in the country illegally and seeking retribution against political opponents.

Second, while his popular majority was modest — about 1.5 points — he won the seven most contested "battleground" states. And he helped to elect a very supportive Republican Congress, which has shown little inclination to oppose even his most controversial nominations and actions.

Third, by granting billionaire Elon Musk’s so-called "Department of Government Efficiency" broad powers, Trump made a series of unilateral spending cuts — and dared opponents to challenge him in court, knowing that is always a time-consuming process.

On the tariffs, Trump simply assumed authority other recent presidents have enjoyed and made far more dramatic and extensive proposals than any even considered.

A Washington cliché, often used to assess the long-term prospects for some controversial undertaking, is that "only time will tell."

That is certainly true for the tariffs. It is far too early to know if Trump will stick with them and if they will ultimately work the way he hopes, inspiring negotiations with major trading partners to reach mutually acceptable compromises.

But so far, neither Trump nor U.S. trading partners have shown signs of backing off, despite rising fears his actions will slow the global economy and could cause a worldwide economic recession.

Once again, a reelected president has sought to expand his mandate into a more far-reaching change than the voters wanted or expected.

Carl P. Leubsdorf is the Washington columnist for the Dallas Morning News.