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He may stretch the truth, but he gets things done.<\/p>\n
Trump kept his promise to move the U.S.\u00a0Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, something his three immediate predecessors also promised yet failed to do. He promised to\u00a0\u201ccrush and destroy ISIS,\u201d<\/a>\u00a0and two years later he is on the verge of eliminating the Islamic State\u2019s physical caliphate. He promised to impose a travel ban on countries that he saw as posing a terrorist threat, and after several false starts the final version of his ban was\u00a0upheld<\/a>\u00a0by the Supreme Court. He promised to punish Syria if it used chemical weapons on its people, and, unlike his immediate predecessor, he followed through \u2014 not\u00a0once\u00a0<\/a>but\u00a0twice<\/a>.<\/p>\n
Trump pledged to nominate Supreme Court justices \u201cin the mold of Justice [Antonin] Scalia,\u201d and now Neil M. Gorsuch and Brett M. Kavanaugh sit on the high court. Trump also pledged to fill the federal appellate courts with young, conservative judges, and so far the Senate has\u00a0confirmed<\/a>\u00a029 \u2014 more than any recent president at this point in his administration.<\/p>\n
Trump vowed to pass historic tax reforms and signed the first major overhaul of the tax code in three decades. He vowed an unprecedented regulatory rollback, with a strict policy to eliminate two existing regulations for every new regulation. In his first year, he\u00a0achieved $8.1 billion<\/a>\u00a0in lifetime regulatory savings and is on track to achieve an\u00a0additional $9.8 billion<\/a>\u00a0this year.<\/p>\n
During the campaign, he\u00a0told African American voters<\/a>, \u201cWhat do you have to lose? .?.?. I will straighten it out. I\u2019ll bring jobs back. We\u2019ll bring spirit back.\u201d On his watch, African American unemployment\u00a0reached<\/a>\u00a0the lowest level ever recorded, and his tax reform included\u00a0a little-noticed provision<\/a>\u00a0creating \u201cOpportunity Zones\u201d to try to revitalize struggling towns and inner-city communities.<\/p>\n
Trump promised to cancel President Barack Obama\u2019s\u00a0Clean Power Plan<\/a>,\u00a0withdraw<\/a>\u00a0from the Paris climate accord,\u00a0approve the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines<\/a>, and\u00a0open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge<\/a>to oil exploration. He fulfilled all of those pledges.<\/p>\n
On trade, he kept his promise to\u00a0withdraw<\/a>\u00a0from the Trans-Pacific Partnership and\u00a0impose\u00a0<\/a>tariffs on steel and aluminum. He also committed to renegotiating NAFTA and the\u00a0U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement\u00a0<\/a>\u2014 and recently\u00a0signed new deals<\/a>\u00a0with Mexico, Canada and\u00a0South Korea<\/a>. He committed to imposing tariffs on China to force it to open its markets and stop its theft of intellectual property \u2014 and is\u00a0following through<\/a>\u00a0on that pledge. Whatever one thinks of Trump\u2019s trade policies, he is doing exactly what he said.<\/p>\n
The president pledged historic increases in defense spending, and\u00a0delivered<\/a>. He pledged to bring back manufacturing jobs, and manufacturing jobs are\u00a0growing at the fastest pace<\/a>\u00a0in more than two decades. He pledged to sign \u201cRight to Try\u201d legislation to give dying Americans access to experimental treatments, and\u00a0did<\/a>. He pledged to take on the opioid epidemic and will soon sign a\u00a0sweeping bipartisan opioids package<\/a>\u00a0into law.<\/p>\n
Where Trump has failed to keep promises, such as building the wall or repealing Obamacare, it has not been for a lack of trying. Only in a few rare instances has he backtracked on a campaign pledge \u2014 such as when he admitted that he was wrong to promise a complete withdrawal of U.S.\u00a0forces from Afghanistan and\u00a0reversed course<\/a>. I\u2019m glad he did.<\/p>\n
But whether one agrees or disagrees is not the point. When Trump says he will do something, you can take it to the bank. Yes, he takes liberties with the truth. But unlike his predecessor, he did not pass his signature legislative achievement on the basis of a\u00a0lie<\/a>\u00a0(\u201cIf you like your health care plan, you can keep it<\/a>\u00a0\u201d) \u2014 which is clearly worse than falsely bragging that your tax cut is the biggest ever.<\/p>\n
The fact is, in his first two years, Trump has compiled a remarkable record of presidential promise\u00a0–\u00a0keeping. He\u2019d probably say it\u2019s the best in history \u2014 which may or may not end up being true. It\u2019s too\u00a0soon to\u00a0tell.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n