Donald Trump is not one to idolize his predecessors. If asked to name his favorite president, he would probably give the same answer as the chess champion, Magnus Carlsen, when asked to name his favorite chess player from the past: “Probably myself, like … four years ago.” But as Trump begins his second term, he has plucked one of the more obscure figures in the American presidential pantheon as a model and inspiration.
“The great President William McKinley,” Trump said in his Second Inaugural Address, “made our country very rich through tariffs and through talent.” Trump’s image of McKinley is suspiciously similar to the one he sees in the mirror. “He was a natural businessman,” Trump added of a man who was saved from financial ruin by a massive bailout from his wealthiest political benefactors.
“Trump’s reaction to being shot was no less remarkable.”
A personal comparison between Trump and McKinley quickly becomes ridiculous. McKinley was gentlehearted. He had no enemies and was incapable of hating. After an assassin shot McKinley at point blank range, mortally wounding the president as he reached out his hand to greet his murderer, McKinley’s first thought was concern for his wife; his second thought was worry for his assassin. “Don’t let them hurt him,” he told his shocked and vengeful bodyguards, as the crowd descended on his killer. Trump’s reaction to being shot was no less remarkable or admirable, but it could not have been more different.
But Trump does have something important in common with McKinley. McKinley’s signature policy when he was elected in 1896 was high tariffs to protect American industry from foreign competition. Tariff policy may not have been the primary motivation for Trump’s voters, but it is the issue dearest to his own heart. “I will immediately begin the overhaul of our trade system to protect American workers and families,” Trump promised in his recent Inaugural address. “Instead of taxing our citizens to enrich other countries, we will tariff and tax foreign countries to enrich our citizens.”
If there is one policy that Trump has advocated consistently throughout his entire public life, it is protectionism. “I believe very strongly in tariffs,” he said nearly 40 years ago. “America is being ripped off. We’re a debtor nation, and we have to tax, we have to tariff, we have to protect this country.” Tariff policy may exhaust Trump’s interest in McKinley’s presidency, but it is only the beginning of the instructive parallels and contrasts between that era and today.