Trump has taken the GOP by storm. But he risks undoing everything that made it great

Whenever Donald Trump quotes Ronald Reagan, one can’t help but think that Reagan would be turning in his grave.

Not because Reagan was a moderate, of course. He wasn’t. He was one of the most ideologically courageous presidents in American history, a true conservative, capable of challenging the prevailing consensus, cutting taxes, fighting communism and restoring confidence to a country that seemed to have lost it. But he was also a man profoundly different from Trump. Different in character, spirit, style and, above all, in his vision of America.

Reagan looked to the future. Trump seems to be living in a state of perpetual election campaigning – against the present, against the past, against his opponents, against his former aides and, at times, against reality itself.

The old Republican Party had many flaws. But it still believed in something greater than its leader. It believed in the free market, individual responsibility, American military strength, Western alliances and the idea that the United States was a positive force in the world. Today, however, it all too often seems to believe only in Donald Trump.

The politics of hope

Reagan won in 49 out of 50 states in 1984. He did not do so by appealing solely to the most disaffected Republican voters. He won because he managed to convey a sense of national unity; his conservatism did not come across as vindictive or even gloomy. He was optimistic. He made Americans believe that tomorrow would be better than today.

His America was the ‘shining city upon a hill’ – a city that was bright, open and full of people who had come from all corners of the world. In his farewell address , he described a city ‘open to anyone with the heart and the will to get there’. Not a fearful fortress, not a besieged country, not a nation that saw an enemy behind every border.

Reagan knew how to talk about problems. When he arrived at the White House, America was reeling from the Vietnam War, the Iran hostage crisis, inflation and a sense of decline. But he did not turn that crisis into a permanent defining feature. He did not tell Americans that they were victims. He told them they could get back on their feet.

Trump does the opposite. His policies almost always stem from fear: immigrants are coming, our allies are robbing us, China is destroying us, the Democrats want to wipe the country off the map, the elites have betrayed the people. There’s always an invasion, a conspiracy, a betrayal. And, of course, there’s always just one man capable of stopping it.

Trump promises greatness, of course. But first he has to convince Americans that everything around them is a disaster. Reagan asked Americans to have confidence in themselves. Trump asks them to be afraid without him.

It’s a huge difference.

Conservatism was not protectionism

Then there’s politics – the real thing.

Reagan believed in free trade. Not naively, and not without exceptions, but he believed that protectionism impoverished consumers, destroyed jobs and ultimately led to retaliation. In 1985, he went so far as to say that trade barriers were almost always self-defeating. The American response to competition should not be to close itself off, but to become even more dynamic, innovative and competitive.

Trump’s Republican Party, on the other hand , promises blanket tariffs, protection for domestic manufacturing and economic self-sufficiency. The 2024 Republican manifesto enshrined protectionism as a central tenet of ‘America First’, and during his second term, Trump continued to present tariffs as one of the main tools of his economic policy.

It’s not just a minor detail. It’s almost a philosophical shift.

Traditional Republicanism believed that America was strong enough to compete on the world stage. Trumpism believes that America must protect itself from the world. Reagan saw trade as an extension of freedom. Trump sees it primarily as a battlefield where some win and some lose.

The same applies to alliances. Reagan knew that American strength also depended on the resilience of the free world. NATO was not a restaurant bill to be split at the end of the evening. It was the political and military community of Western democracies. He made it clear that, if NATO remained strong and united, Europe and America would remain free.

Trump is right when he demands that Europeans spend more on defence. In fact, on this point, many Europeans should thank him rather than take offence. He is also right when he criticises the West’s dependence on China or when he calls for tighter border controls. The problem is not that Trump is always wrong. The problem is the overall vision within which he frames these positions.

For Reagan, allies were multipliers of American power. For Trump, they often seem like customers who have to pay for American products. Even support for Ukraine is described primarily by emphasising that the weapons are being bought by the Europeans and that the American taxpayer must not have to foot the bill. It is a foreign policy that has been turned into a bill.

A party transformed into a person

The most serious issue, however, is not even the tariffs or isolationism. It is what Trump has done to the Republican Party.

A great party cannot be built on personal loyalty to one man. It must have principles that outlive its leaders. The GOP of Reagan, Bush Senior, Bush Junior, McCain and Romney was an often-contentious coalition. It comprised libertarians, religious conservatives, neoconservatives, moderates from the North-East, foreign policy hawks and free-market advocates. They did not always see eye to eye – quite the contrary. But that is precisely why it was a genuine party.

These days, the main criterion for determining who is a good Republican seems to be much simpler: how far are they prepared to go to defend Donald Trump?

Under Trump, the party has certainly won over new working-class voters and upset the old political balance. It would be foolish to deny this. He understood , before anyone else , the anger in deindustrialised areas, the crisis on the border, the sense of abandonment felt by a section of the middle class, and the cultural arrogance of certain progressive elites.

But understanding anger does not mean you have to keep feeding it forever.

Trump has turned resentment into an inexhaustible source of political energy. It works electorally, at least up to a point. But it eats away at everything: institutions, language, respect between opponents, and even the ability to acknowledge victory or defeat without crying ‘conspiracy’.

Politics cannot be an emotional civil war fought every day on social media. And a conservative party, above all, should know this. To be conservative means to protect institutions, traditions and boundaries. It does not mean burning everything down just because one’s candidate is angry.

We miss the American dream

Perhaps that is what is missing most of all: the American dream.

Not the American dream reduced to an election slogan or a red cap. The real one. The idea that a person can arrive in the United States with nothing, work, build a business and become an American. The idea that someone else’s success is not necessarily a threat. The idea that economic freedom creates opportunities, that the West is worth defending, and that America still has a mission in the world.

The old Republican Party believed that America was exceptional because it was free. The new Republican Party seems to think that it is exceptional simply because it is American. That is not the same thing.

Reagan spoke of a self-assured nation. Trump speaks of a nation that needs to be constantly reassured that it has not been humiliated. Reagan saw America as a role model. Trump all too often portrays it as a victim in need of vindication.

Yet the free world cannot be led by anger alone. A lasting coalition cannot be built simply by pointing the finger at enemies. The West cannot be defended whilst disregarding the alliances that hold it together. And one cannot speak of economic freedom whilst erecting new tariff barriers.

Ronald Reagan wasn’t perfect. The old Republican Party wasn’t perfect. George W. Bush made huge mistakes, Mitt Romney wasn’t a great communicator, and John McCain could be exasperatingly stubborn. But they were men who believed that America should lead the free world, not withdraw from it. They still believed that politics could be something more noble than a string of insults.

We miss that Republican Party. We miss its optimism, its internationalism, its faith in the market and, above all, its faith in America.

Trump has taken over the GOP. He has defeated almost all his internal rivals and forced the party to change its character. But a takeover is not always a victory. Sometimes you can take possession of a house by destroying everything that made it worth living in.

The Republican Party will survive Donald Trump. America’s major political parties survive almost anything. The question is what will remain once Trump is gone.

And above all, if anyone still has the courage to open the windows, let in a bit of light and remind Americans that it’s morning in America once again.