Trump was the worst President in U.S. History.
I would say second-worst after Andrew Jackson. Hard to beat genocide in order to make a massive land grab.
I’m surprised at the amount of disagreement your comment is getting.
I don’t want to downplay Jackson’s displacement of American Indians, but there was one real FUBAR thing Jackson did that no one remembers:
He paid off the national debt.
Completely and entirely. The federal government existed debt free for some months (I forget exactly how long, I want to say it was a year or so before borrowing exceeded income).
On the face of it, this probably sounds like a good thing, but it hard crashed the economy. Obv wasn’t alive at the time, but it’s my understanding that it was the worst economic disaster until the Great Depression (and The Great Depression was only worse because the country and world were far more connected than the world of Jackson’s day).
That said, I hear inauguration party was a real rager.
The difference for me comes down to the relative power both men had. If the US had been the sole hyperpower on the planet, Jackson may well have out-Hitlered Hitler. If Trump’s administration wasn’t actively engaged in sabotaging his deranged orders to attack Venezuela and Iran, we’d probably still be at war. Trump exercised authority over 300M people and has, probably for the remainder of our lifetimes, permanently altered politics in the US and around the world, while Jackson’s ability, monster that he was, was constrained that the US was not a significant world power at the time.
Trump activity attempting to overthrow the Federal Government pushes him beyond Jackson. Moving the Southeast Tribes to Oklahoma was a fall out of the War of 1812 against the Tribes who joined the British. It doesn’t remove how horrible that was. Moving so many people during a pandemic of Yellow Fever was inexcusable. Obviously Jackson didn’t care.
I still think Trump attempts to overthrow the government is worse as well as losing 20 million jobs, making the Covid pandemic worse by inaction, and all his criminal activity.
Trump activity attempting to overthrow the Federal Government pushes him beyond Jackson.
I doubt most indigenous Americans would agree.
Tbh Andrew Johnson (became president after Lincoln was assassinated) is pretty high up there, too. I might actually put him ahead of Trump in terribleness, because a lot of the regressive societal shit we are dealing with now - and have been dealing with for around 150 years - can be directly attributed to Johnson’s softball treatment of the Confeds during reintegration.
Personally, I’m very bitter about the completely awful effects of Reagan’s tenure. Literally turned the office into a Hollywood act; you know damn well he wasn’t calling the shots. He was there to draw people’s attention.
Let’s not forget the “war on drugs” as well. A lot of awful things came from the Reagan era.
He also defunded 99% of American science to pour billions into a hole in Texas that never had a chance of working.
Ever notice how all major breakthroughs these days come from non-US scientists? The scene never recovered.
Trump/Kushner did try to weaponize the COVID response against blue regions that voted Democrat. That’s pretty bad
