The Boomerang Presidency

Keith Raffel
Wed, 01 Apr 2026 13:39:05 -0700
Opinion

My first thought when sitting down to write this column was that Donald Trump is his own worst enemy. However, after 8 million people showed up on March 28 to oppose him and his policies, it appears he has some stiff competition for the title.

Still, I'll allow Trump to make the case against himself. Here are 10 times the policy arrows Trump fired at problems became boomerangs that hit him in the head.

1. Trump was elected in no small part to bring down inflation. Upon taking office, he imposed tariffs that he claimed would be paid by foreign producers. A study by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York estimates that nearly 90% of tariff costs are absorbed by domestic importers and consumers, directly fueling the inflation he promised to extinguish.
Updated: Wed Apr 01, 2026

My first thought when sitting down to write this column was that Donald Trump is his own worst enemy. However, after 8 million people showed up on March 28 to oppose him and his policies, it appears he has some stiff competition for the title.

Still, I'll allow Trump to make the case against himself. Here are 10 times the policy arrows Trump fired at problems became boomerangs that hit him in the head.

1. Trump was elected in no small part to bring down inflation. Upon taking office, he imposed tariffs that he claimed would be paid by foreign producers. A study by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York estimates that nearly 90% of tariff costs are absorbed by domestic importers and consumers, directly fueling the inflation he promised to extinguish.

2. Trump has spent his entire presidency undermining NATO. When he needed help from NATO allies in the war against Iran, they were reluctant to provide it. Spain, for example, closed its airspace to U.S. warplanes, and its prime minister declared, "You cannot respond to one illegality with another, because that's how humanity's great disasters begin."

3. Trump cut back on American support for solar panels, wind farms and electric cars, labeling them part of a "Green New Scam" and a "woke" agenda. So, now the world economy remains reliant on oil from the Persian Gulf states. Prices at the gas pump are zooming and adding to inflation. The American president's pro-carbon fuel policy has handed Iran a trump card in the current war.

4. Trump appointed Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to reform the Department of Health and Human Services. In 2020, there were 13 measles cases in the United States. As of March 26, 2026, confirmed cases have surged to 1,575, a hundredfold increase in just three months compared to all of 2020.

5. Trump's policy moves have curtailed even legal immigration. The lack of workers in farm fields and building sites is sowing inflation in both food and housing.

6. In 2020, Trump promised to end "the era of endless wars." On Feb. 28, 2026, he launched a war against Iran without making a compelling case on why he did so. As American soldiers died and gas prices zoomed, his approval numbers plummeted to an all-time low.

7. Trump also declared war on American higher education in an attempt to "punish" elite universities for their campus politics. By stifling American innovation, he is allowing China to challenge the U.S. for the global lead in AI. Moreover, potentially lifesaving medical research in university labs has been squelched. Last year, a stop-work order paralyzed a $60-million "TB Moonshot" led by professor Sarah Fortune at Harvard and aimed at developing a vaccine for the world's deadliest infectious disease. Late last month, Trump's Justice Department doubled down, suing Harvard to claw back billions in grants.

8. He vowed to round up violent criminals who were in the United States illegally. Instead, he sent armed Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers to Minneapolis where they shot dead two law-abiding American citizens exercising their First Amendment right "peaceably to assemble."

9. Back in 2011, Trump called a potential government shutdown a "tremendously negative mark on the President of the United States." Trump has refused to compromise over the current partial shutdown which led to over a month of long lines at American airports.

10. Without asking for any authorization, Trump bulldozed the East Wing of the White House to make room for a palatial golden ballroom. Now, a federal court judge, who appointed by George W. Bush, has halted work at the site unless and until the project is approved by Congress. Trump is now left with nothing more than a hole in the ground.

As Trump watches his initiatives bounce off the wall and hit him between the eyes, he acts more like a confused child than a commander-in-chief. He can blame the 8 million voices shouting outside the White House gates all he wants, but the most damaging blows aren't coming from the crowd. They're coming from the boomerangs he himself threw. In the end, he is indeed his own worst enemy.