Gregory Jack: The New Republicans were real. They’re worse than I thought

Donald Trump may be less the architect of MAGA than he is its permission to exist

Not storm clouds, technically, but you get the idea

By: Gregory Jack

We are now a third of the way into Donald Trump’s second term as President of the United States. It has been, whatever you think of his politics, chaotic. Global tariffs. Mass deportations. Violence in American cities. War in the Middle East.

It has also been long enough to reconsider the prognostications of what a second Trump term would be like.

A little over a year ago, I wrote my first piece for The Line. In it, I argued that Trump’s return to office represented a wholesale takeover of the Republican Party by a new sort of Republican, less concerned with free markets and small-c conservative values, and more preoccupied with expansionism, nationalism and interventionist politics. I said Trump himself was the “tip of the spear” who would act to enable this New Republican movement.

What did I get right, and what did I get wrong? I would argue that my analysis was largely correct in direction, but I got the coherence of the moment wrong, and in that respect things are actually worse than I predicted.

First, the geopolitics. I argued tariffs would be one of several instruments the New Republicans would use to exert power, influence and control. This has proven largely correct. Trump and his administration have entangled America in several global confrontations, despite explicit promises to stay out of them, with Iran only the latest. The sloppy execution of the global tariff policy shift does not negate what Trump and his followers have attempted to achieve, which is turning tariffs from something to be avoided through trade agreements, into a tool to exert control. And as I wrote at the time, it has indeed turned out that no agreement with this administration is really permanent.

Territorial claims, as I anticipated, have only grown more forceful. Trump doubled and tripled down on attempts to acquire Greenland, mused about soon having the “honour” of taking Cuba, oversaw the removal of Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro to face trial in the U.S., and continued his 51^st state threats toward Canada. Trump suffered the ugly falling out with Musk that I predicted, though their relationship has since proven more transactional than permanently severed.

Trump has also proceeded to withdraw America from the very multilateral institutions I called on Canada to find ways to support, despite their many failings. Prime Minister Mark Carney’s attempt to rally the middle powers of the world may represent Canada heeding that call, albeit with mixed results so far.

There are two areas where I believe my analysis was incomplete, or perhaps simply wrong. The first is the role of Trump himself. It is still not entirely clear whether a change in the presidency would result in a change in direction. Would America be able to repair the damage it has done to relationships with allies under a different Republican president? Congress has proven to be even more inept than expected, and the aggressive raids, unlawful detentions and enforcement actions against not only undocumented immigrants but in some cases American citizens have made for shocking headlines; these actions were enabled by more people than just Trump. It is clear many in his orbit share his objectives, if not his style. He may be less the architect of MAGA than he is its permission to exist.

Trump’s TACO tendencies — “Trump Always Chickens Out” — have also been underscored by incoherence and resistance in actual American foreign policy. There are clearly those surrounding him who will carry out his orders, but it isn’t everyone. The military has lost several senior leaders who have drawn a line in the sand. It is impossible to know how many others have stood up to the president behind closed doors, nor what the world would look like if he was fully and completely left to his own early morning urges.

The best way to describe the president’s overall focus is Shiny Object Syndrome. If we wait long enough, the world has learned, attention will turn elsewhere, and many of the threats have proven to be no more than bluster. But not all of them. Trump has kept the world perpetually on edge and never really knowing if he is bluffing or not. It’s likely that is all by design. No one thought we’d be seriously considering the possibility of defending Canada from an American military threat, and yet it’s clear our leaders, and the public, found themselves contemplating the possibility.

What is most grating, most difficult to understand or make sense of, is the gaslighting, and that extends beyond the president himself. Line editor Jen Gerson wondered about how to resolve this in a post on X recently, and no answer is obvious. The U.S. is not playing by any agreed-upon rulebook anymore. The world simply cannot tell which threats are serious, which are negotiating tactics, and which are nothing more than impulsive performances. Some readers may be able to relate from their own personal experiences, as every country now finds itself in an emotionally abusive relationship with the United States and the man who leads it. There is no rational response to gaslighting except naming it, and doing so has proven to do little good.

My homogeneous characterization of the New Republican was therefore a little too neat and tidy. Trump has surrounded himself with a coalition of competing interests who overlap but do not want the same state. Some want a stronger state; others want a gutted state; others still want a state that inflicts vengeance and violence on perceived enemies simply for the sake of violence, because it can. Rather than a single, disciplined “New Republican” doctrine, we have experienced a collection of interests and actors who have been released from their guardrails.

One group I predicted would benefit but has not is the American worker. Scores of economists warned the tariffs would be bad for the average American, and this has largely proven true. The original promise was that tariffs would restore jobs and wages, but that has only happened unevenly, with the benefits concentrated among the few. That this damage continues to be successfully waved aside as short-term pain for long-term gain (most recently on the price of gas), and that this framing remains largely believed by MAGA, reflects serious cognitive dissonance by a section of the electorate. There is no other way to characterize it, except to say it resembles a form of endless blind faith.

And what of the world’s response? The constraints in America have proven more durable than expected. Tariffs didn’t destroy economies — America’s or others’ — as much as many predicted. There have indeed been some benefits to some Americans, and to some companies. Damage has been done, but so far it has been managed. A Federal Reserve analysis found 2025 tariffs reaching consumers through higher prices more slowly and less severely than the 2018-2019 China tariffs. The simple claim that tariffs are immediately catastrophic for an economy has proven too simplistic.

Inflation has emerged as the real, durable threat, especially where tariffs interact with energy costs. The American worker in the U.S. is measurably not better off. The Middle East remains unresolved, but whatever the constraints were, the nuclear option has not (yet) been invoked, even if it has been tacitly threatened.

It could all still end very, very badly. I don’t think, given the past year, that anyone seriously believes the president will avoid further global conflicts in the remainder of his term. He will remain predictably unpredictable and only temporarily appeasable by flattery. The midterms remain a grounding point for those hoping for change, but how legitimate they will be is increasingly in question. No one is certain any longer that this is Trump’s final term.

Finally, Canada has proven rather inept at the policy prescriptions I offered near the end of my article. Build pipelines and buy icebreakers is still the prescription, but one that we have continued to struggle with filling. The Carney administration has said all the right things, and even done some of them, but our ability to protect our sovereignty through hard state capacity has proven questionable. We’re not moving fast enough, even if Carney believes he’s moving as fast as possible. America has proven dangerous because its state is now unconstrained; we are vulnerable because our state appears underpowered.

Now we know that there is no single, rational way to deal with this administration. The lesson for Canada is that diagnosis is not capacity. We can say sovereignty and “elbows up” as often as we like, and talk endlessly about the Arctic, pipelines, building Canada and middle power diplomacy. Unless we can actually build, buy, permit, deploy and defend at speed, sovereignty remains a slogan and security an aspiration. My original prescription was basically right. What I underestimated was how inadequately we are equipped to follow it.

If we cannot build capacity fast enough, we must change our tactics. Canada and other middle powers cannot match American hard power. Weaponizing asymmetrical advantages like critical minerals, energy reserves and Arctic geography must therefore serve as the political ammunition needed. Nor can Canada successfully appeal to the “better angels” in a deliberately unpredictable administration. We’re seeing the limits of this in the CUSMA negotiations right now. Every past concession is forgotten, replaced by a new demand. Every action taken by Canada labelled as unfair; every action by America as a just response to grievance.

We no longer have the luxury of waiting for capacity to build itself. To survive an unconstrained American state, we must become the only thing they respect: a hard target.

Gregory Jack is senior vice president with Ipsos Public Affairs (Canada)

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