Broken Promises and Democratic Function
Presidential campaigns are built on the backs of promises. Each candidate describes their goals
for their presidency, and what they will strive to achieve. Some goals are not meant to be fully completed, but a large portion of these promises are reasonable to accomplish. When the government makes false promises it undermines democratic legitimacy and prevents the people from voting for meaningful change.
Donald J. Trump made a plethora of promises during his lengthy campaign, and a large portion of these have not been completed.
Promise #1: He would create new jobs
Job creation has greatly slowed since Trump took office. In 2025, the United States only added 184,000 jobs, the lowest year since the pandemic, significantly falling under the predicted growth of $584,000 (Groundwork Collaborative, 2025). According to a 2026 report by CNN, in February the economy lost around 100,000 jobs, and unemployment held out at 4.4%. In data compiled by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, it is clearly evident that job loss was the norm in the first years of Trump’s presidency
However, as also evidenced by this table, we can see that job growth in march greatly increased, straying away from the previously negative trends. 178,000 jobs added, comparatively, is not impressive, but merely hopeful. Even with the growth in March, in the larger scheme of Trump’s presidency this point serves as an outlier.
Promise #2: Inflation will decrease
The Trump administration promised that inflation would decrease, say one, but despite this, economists have noted rises in inflation, and expect this trend to continue for the duration of Trump’s term. Research by the Center for American Progress describes how inflation has steadily remained above the federal goal of 2 percent, and the authors cited two studies attributing this elongated increase to the actions of the current administration. In a research article published by the American Federation of Teachers, addressing how Trump has broken promises to the working class, the authors discuss how “Inflation has surged to 3 percent” (AFT, n.d).
Promise #3: Consumer prices will go down
In the same paper by the Center for American Progress, the evidence clearly shows that tariffs are responsible for a drastic increase in consumer spending and grocery prices. To be exact, the researchers estimate that Americans are paying $17,500 more to build a new home, small business owners are paying $25,000 more to import goods, and the average household is paying about $17,000 more (2026). A similar study published in the New York Times reaffirms this claim, describing how grocery prices have risen at the fastest rate since 2022 due to importing tariffs implemented by the Trump admin (Draper & Cresswell, 2025).
Promise #4: No new wars
One of the most vital aspects to Donald Trump’s campaign was his promise of “No New Wars”. He has been repeating that phrase over the past decade.
(Writing cannot emphasize enough how constantly this idea was repeated by the President so a video is attached below)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BumE9rI6js
Despite these promises of international cooperation and diplomacy the President has ruthlessly engaged in conflicts across the globe. First, the President invaded Venezuela, capturing the leader, and bringing him to the United States. Then, the President cooperated with Israel to invade, bomb, and engage in conflict with Iran. In both instances American feet stepped on the soil of different countries to fight foreign agents. In both instances, the peace was not held. Similarly, existing conflicts were not resolved.
Promise #5: An end to the war in Russia and Ukraine
The War in Russia and Ukraine is ongoing. Regardless of promises that the war would end on Day 1, lives are still being lost in mass. In fact, a new report by the United Nations (UN) found that 2025 was the deadliest year for Ukraine since 2025, with over 2,000 Ukrainians being murdered (UN Human Rights, 2026).
Promise #6: Lower Gas Prices
After entry into a war with Iran, gas prices have slowly climbed over the past month. Now, gas prices across the country are nearing a staggering $4 per gallon. IVTB news published a headline detailing these shocking prices, citing data from the AAA that found the national average was more than $4 a gallon. Out of all states, data found that the lowest average was $3.28, still marking a large increase from the previous averages that hovered around $2. Trump’s action in Iran has measurable and predictable outcomes. Economists globally are well aware of the strategic advantage the Strait of Hormuz has. These decisions are made consciously by the President, and passed through a team of advisors, economists, and military experts, all who would report the consequences of military action. Yet the decision was still made and violence still continues in the region.
Promise #7: Capping credit card interest rates
Another campaign promsie of Trump was capping credit card interest rates at 10%. The action taken has been questionable and challenged by many democratic lawmakers. Senator Elizabeth Warren has gone into lengthy detail about this, so for clarity, here are excerpts from her piece on the president's failure (op-ed dated Febrauary 23)
Initially, Trump did propose action. In fact, “On January 9, the President seemed poised to act. He announced that credit card companies will no longer rip off the American people – and then he politely asked the biggest banks to put in place a one-year, 10% cap on credit card interest rates by January 20.”
However, she also details how this polite request for the credit card companies to change was an interesting measure to challenge the credit debt crises. To no one's surprise, “That was six weeks ago. President Trump’s January 20 deadline has come and gone, and no one is surprised that the big banks have not voluntarily cut credit card rates to help American families” As of today, April 4, 2026, this credit card interest cap has still not been put in place.
Warren also described how the people and the legislature is ready. She says that “Americans want relief – and Democrats are ready. After the President called me, I reached out repeatedly to his Chief of Staff Susie Wiles to share ideas about how to design an emergency 10% rate cap that prohibits banks from retaliating by shutting down accounts, reducing credit lines, or devaluing rewards. I also explained how we could transition to a permanent rate cap, so credit card companies can’t go right back to ripping people off after one year.” (Warren, 2026).
This once again reflects a massive failure of the President to implement meaningful action promised in his campaign. Requests and polite asks don’t make change. Legislation and action does.
Promise #8: Protection of Social Security
Trump also made numerous promises about Social Security prior to his election, the most significant of which being his promise to end the taxation of Social Security, and a guarantee to protect it. Trump claimed to pass laws contributing to the end of Social Security taxation, but his Big Beautfiul Bill and his Flagship tax and Spending Law did “nothing of the sort” (Williams, 2025). Despite the benefits of his new program, and possible tax deductions offered by these changes, the point of the matter is that his word was not kept. According to an article published by the Democrats, addressing the broken promises of the president, they describe how “Trump’s own Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent admitted that Trump’s “One, Big, Beautiful Bill” is a “backdoor for privatizing Social Security,” after Trump stacked the Social Security Administration with incompetent leadership, and Shadow President Elon Musk gutted the agency” (2025).
Promise #9: Reduction of the national debt
A yahoo finance headline clearly describes one of Trump's key promises and consequences:
The Committee for a Responsible Budget agrees with this figure, estimating that in the next ten years Trump’s policy and executive action will result in an added $8.4 trillion dollars to the national debt.
The current president with the most highest debt added is Joe Biden, with a similar $8.4 trillion added. However, when we look at both of Trump’s terms, he currently sits at the most debt added, and as the debt keeps expanding, he could well surpass the most debt added by a President in a single term. Once again, his commitment to public demand and commitment to the subsequent conduct necessary to achieve these goals are both lackluster.
Promise #10: The Epstein FIles
Arguably the biggest controversy in American history, Trump’s involvement with the Epstein files, and his involvement with the release of new information surrounding the files has stunned the global community. Trump committed himself to public disclosure of this incredibly vital information, but failed to follow through after being elected. The Epstein files are an increrdibly long record of relationships between Epstein and thousands of elire people from a variety of fields. The calls for the release of these files have been ongoing since his arrest and would give the public insight into the true nature of Epsteins pedophilia ring. Trump and his allis promised on numerous occassions that he would release the files and would be fully transparent with the information in them. Despite this, after information about Trump in these files was released, tehre was mass delays, conflicting statements, and narratives developing that were constantly evolving.
During Trump’s first presidency there was no initiative to release the files and there was actually no large scale declassifcation of files beyond standard court procedures. The executive branch has direct influence over the Department of Justice and effort towards transparency would have absolutely been in the President's reach.
After the death of Epstein in 2019 Trump publicly supported conspiracy theories that the death of Esptein could’ve involved political opponents. He failed to analyze existing evidence, used the death as a political weapon, and shifted the narrative towards speculation.
Under Trump’s Department of justice, the attorney general, William Barr, released very limited information about Epstein’s death, did not release any broader cleint list, and reflected the Trump adminstrations failure to disclose relevant information when it really mattered
Trump has frequently stated he wants to clear the deep state, or, “drain the swamp” as he says. Once again, there was no major effort to declassify or expose major networks related to Esptein. This not only shows his failure to keep Epstein related promises, but demonstrates a broader trend of inconsistency.
In 2025, Trump’s administration ordered a review of the Epstein Files. Upon review, the Department of Justice stated there was no client list, and no further exposures would be made. Again, the Trump administration across terms consistently failed to be transparent.
Trump’s resistance to release continued to grow into late 2025, and public outrage grew to a point of no return. Deadlines were met and passed, hearings were held, and much of congress intensely questioned political figures like Kash Patel and Pam Bondi on the release of the files. Eventually though, the files were released
Regardless of release, the files were heavily redacted, and information continued to be withheld. Many releases provided no new information, and pages upon pages were blacked out entirely. Full public transparency has still not been met.
Bibliography
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