The shockwaves of the election of Donald Trump — a thrice-married — 70-year-old reality TV star with no political experience – as president of the United States (U.S.), are still reverberating around the world. Trump had earlier defeated 16 experienced politicians in the Republican primaries, but few gave him a chance of defeating Hillary Clinton. A corporate media, self-absorbed pundits, and cocksure pollsters had all seriously underestimated him. Trump’s campaign had spent more on hats than pollsters, he had not deployed enough “ground troops” to get out the vote, and his campaign had less funds than Clinton’s well-oiled machine.

Few felt it possible that a candidate with a suspect temperament who had alienated Muslims, Latinos, blacks, women, and war veterans could win a presidential campaign in such a diverse country as America. Trump abandoned the dog-whistle of conservative mainstream politicians, and instead openly spewed bile and prejudice. He ran a prejudiced, nationalistic campaign which promised to deport millions of illegal immigrants, bar Muslims from entering the U.S., and bring American jobs back home.. While smug East and West coast liberal elite sneered, marginalised working-class whites cheered.

This was an anti-establishment insurgency fuelled by angry whites feeling anxious about declining wages, globalisation, and multiculturalism. After eight years of a black president, Barack Obama, and with projections of whites becoming a minority by 2050, a majority crying out for change responded with fury at the thought of an entitled, establishment white woman  who had been in the public eye for a quarter of a century, becoming president. Hillary Clinton was distrusted by 67% of voters, a fact reinforced by 30,000 emails being deleted from a private server used while she was Secretary of State (though the US Federal Bureau of Investigation cleared her of any criminal offence).

Portraying himself as the anti-establishment figure who could drain the stench-filled “swamp” that politics in Washington had become, Trump spoke in the vulgar idiom of the mob. He was determined to light a bonfire of vanities under the political establishment. Clinton crucially struggled to win over the white working class in America’s “Rust Belt”: Ohio, Michigan, Iowa, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania. Trump was eventually carried to victory by the votes of 63% of white men, 52% of white women, 29% of Latinos, and 29% of Asians. The polyglot electoral coalition of women, minorities, and millennials that Obama had meticulously built over a decade spectacularly crumbled without him on the ticket.

The painstakingly constructed edifice of Obama’s eight-year presidential legacy could also soon be dismantled with the Republican control of the White House, the Senate, and the House of Representatives. Obamacare, the nuclear deal with Iran, and the rapprochement with Cuba are all under threat. With the refusal of the Republican-led Senate to confirm Obama’s Supreme Court nominee for nine months, Trump now has the chance to elect a conservative judge to swing the court’s ideological majority, threatening civil rights, abortion rights, and gay marriage. Obama’s indefatigable, but ultimately futile, campaign to get Clinton elected was motivated by the need to preserve his legacy, as well as a personal grudge against her opponent who had fathered the “birther movement” that had consistently questioned Obama’s American ancestry.

Trump has proved himself to be a proverbial cat with nine lives. His campaign had been written off several times, most notably after the recent release of a 2005 video in which he made lecherous comments about sexually assaulting women. Any candidate would have been fatally wounded in any normal election year. But this was not a normal election year. It was the year of the populist insurgent at the head of an angry white coalition determined to seize the White House. This was despite the fact that Trump was the first candidate in four decades to have refused to release his tax returns, and had used tax loopholes to avoid paying federal taxes for several years. In this unlikely insurrection, a billionaire has led a pitchfork peasant revolution with supporters determined to give the political establishment a bloody nose.

There are several parallels between the victory of Donald Trump and that of fellow Republican, George W. Bush’s defeat of Al Gore in 2000. Both candidates seemed ill-prepared to govern; both had a rudimentary grasp of international affairs; and both clearly lost all three presidential debates to their more intellectually substantive Democratic opponents. But whereas Bush recognised his limitations and as president, relied on his advisers to rule. Trump may draw the opposite lesson from his unorthodox victory and decide to rely on his own instincts rather than knowledge-based advice. He has promised to cut taxes for the rich, increase tariffs, build a wall on the border with Mexico, and renegotiate military and trade deals. The consequences for America and the world could be enormous. As Trump prepares to board Air Force One – the US. presidential jet – the world should fasten its collective seat-belts. There is turbulence ahead.

Adebajo is Executive Director of the Centre for Conflict Resolution, Cape Town, South Africa

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