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So what is likely to feature in the Kenyatta –Trump meeting? Grant Harris, former Obama principal advisor on Africa in the White House and CEO of Harris Africa Partners joins CNBC Africa to share insights.

What to expect from Trump-Kenyatta meeting

Holly Ellyatt
Source: <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2018/08/23/now-trump-is-having-a-twitter-spat-with-south-africa-over-land-reforms.html">Trump hypes fringe talking point about South African government &#8216;seizing land from white farmers&#8217;</a>
<ul>
<li>President Trump says he has instructed Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to &#8220;closely study the South Africa land and farm seizure and large scale killing of farmers.&#8221; </li>
<li>In a tweet, he hypes a fringe talking point about Pretoria &#8220;seizing land from white farmers.&#8221;</li>
<li>His late night tweet about South African land reform prompts a sharp response from the government.</li>
</ul>
President Donald Trump says he has instructed Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to &#8220;closely study the South Africa land and farm seizure and large scale killing of farmers,&#8221; hyping a fringe talking point about Pretoria &#8220;seizing land from white farmers.&#8221;
His tweet late Wednesday ET about South Africa land reform prompted a sharp response from the government.
He included the handle of Fox News Channel host Tucker Carlson in his tweet. Carlson had discussed the issue on his show Wednesday, introducing the segment by saying, &#8221; 
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa 
 has just begun the process of seizing land from his own citizens, without compensation, because they&#8217;re the wrong skin color. That is literally the definition of racism.&#8221;
Carlson then went on to criticize &#8220;elites&#8221; that criticize Trump for racism while &#8220;paying no attention&#8221; to the &#8220;racist government of South Africa.&#8221; The segment seems to have prompted Trump to instruct Pompeo to look into the matter.
Tweet I have asked Secretary of State @SecPompeo to closely study the South Africa land and farm seizures and expropriations and the large scale killing of farmers. &#8220;South African Government is now seizing land from white farmers.&#8221; @TuckerCarlson @FoxNews
Trump&#8217;s comment on South Africa is the first time he has used the word &#8220;Africa&#8221; on the social media platform since becoming president.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://d16akly8855cs7.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/04200241/105373625-1533274925072gettyimages-898614786.1910x1000.jpg" alt="" height="1000" width="1910" data-licensor-name="Gulshan Khan | AFP | Getty Images"/>
The South African government was quick to respond Thursday. &#8220;South Africa totally rejects this narrow perception which only seeks to divide our nation and reminds us of our colonial past,&#8221; the government said.
Tweet South Africa totally rejects this narrow perception which only seeks to divide our nation and reminds us of our colonial past. #landexpropriation @realDonaldTrump @PresidencyZA
 
In a second tweet also directed at Trump, Pretoria said it would &#8220;speed up the pace of land reform in a careful and inclusive manner that does not divide our nation.&#8221;
Later Thursday, South Africa Foreign Minister Lindiwe Sisulu said it was regrettable that Trump&#8217;s tweet was &#8220;based on false information,&#8221; Reuters reported. Sisulu said she had instructed officials in her department to meet with the U.S. embassy in Pretoria to seek clarification on the matter, the news agency added.
&#8216;Black people want their land back&#8217;
Land reforms in South Africa are high on the government&#8217;s agenda and have stirred controversy.
At the start of August, Ramaphosa announced plans by the ruling African National Congress to change the constitution to allow the expropriation of land without compensation.
The government sees these changes as a way to boost the country&#8217;s agricultural sector and economy. Opponents say it is a threat to food security and the economy.
The bulk of South Africa&#8217;s land 
is owned by its minority white population, a vestige of its colonial past, 
 thus they are likely to be most affected by the changes.
Despite the end of apartheid, South Africa&#8217;s institutionalized segregation of races, in the early 1990s and the first black president of South Africa, Nelson Mandela, being elected in 1994, racial and economic divisions remain entrenched in the country a quarter of a century later.
Announcing the land reforms, Ramaphosa said the changes would &#8220;promote redress, advance economic development, increase agricultural production and food security.&#8221; The move alarmed investors and the rand fell to a one-week low against the dollar.
On Monday night, Ramaphosa went further, saying in a speech on land reforms that these were the only way to let a &#8220;festering wound&#8221; heal and that &#8220;black people want their land back,&#8221; national newspaper Business Day reported.
The notion that 
white farmers are persecuted in South Africa largely stems from a fringe group called AfriForum 
. Some far-right commentators and pundits have picked up on the idea, suggesting that there could be a &#8220;genocide&#8221; of white people in the country.
Trump&#8217;s wife, Melania, is planning to visit several African countries in October, without her husband, who has referred to immigrants from some African countries in 
disparaging language 
.

Trump hypes fringe talking point about South African government ‘seizing land from white farmers’

Nyshka Chandran
Source: <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/25/brics-could-benefit-from-global-trade-tensions.html">The world&#8217;s major emerging economies could end up benefiting from global trade tensions</a>
<ul>
<li>Escalating trade tensions, and tariffs from U.S. President Donald Trump&#8217;s administration, could give BRICS countries fresh purpose to push forward their trade agendas.</li>
<li>Divergent trade policies between members, however, could be a problem.</li>
<li>The bloc — which consists of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa — has struggled to establish a unified voice on the international stage.</li>
</ul>
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://d16akly8855cs7.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/26140344/105350807-1532496152485gettyimages-967163620.1910x1000.jpg" alt="" height="1000" width="1910" data-licensor-name="Alexander Shcherbak | TASS"/>
The bloc of emerging economies known as 
BRICS 
 have long struggled to establish a unified voice on the international stage, but U.S. President Donald Trump may be providing them with an unlikely boost.
As the leaders of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa gather in Johannesburg on Wednesday for their annual meeting, the issue of trade protectionism is set to dominate talks amid 
Trump&#8217;s proposed tariffs 
 on the European Union and Beijing. If the five-member group plays its cards right, it can use the matter to push forward the nations&#8217; own trade agendas.
BRICS members have an interest in developing a world with multiple countries filling leadership roles, so they will be looking to &#8220;take advantage&#8221; of tensions to &#8220;to build up the profile of BRICS,&#8221; said Duncan Innes-Ker, regional director for Asia at The Economist Intelligence Unit.
BRICS has sought to reject the Western dominance of international institutions, but a lack of unity prevents members from coming up with an alternative solution. Now, with Trump&#8217;s duties on imported steel and aluminum set to hurt each BRICS member — Beijing, New Delhi and Moscow have already responded with retaliatory duties — the bloc has fresh purpose to rally together.
That&#8217;s a positive for Beijing, 
which is now trying to tout itself as a champion of free trade 
 and has claimed it was &#8221; 
forced 
&#8221; to fight back against Trump&#8217;s measures with reciprocal tariffs.
&#8220;Given the failure of the 
G-20 finance ministers meeting 
 held earlier this week to defuse the threat to world trade from rising protectionism, the BRICS summit is likely to become a key global forum for galvanizing global support for multilateral trade liberalization,&#8221; said Rajiv Biswas, Asia-Pacific chief economist at IHS Markit.
The Trump administration has said it is not advocating protectionism, but rather seeking to even a playing field that has been corrupted by unfair trade practices. Those penalized by Trump&#8217;s tariffs, however, have tried to paint the U.S. as no longer interested in free trade, vacating its traditional role on the global stage.
BRICS countries may try to step into that gap, negotiating wide-ranging trade agreements with many countries, Biswas continued.
The volatile global trade backdrop could also benefit emerging markets in more tangible ways.
&#8220;China might turn to India, Brazil, Russia &#8230; to source products it originally bought from the U.S., such as soy beans, wheat, and meat,&#8221; said Alex Capri, visiting senior fellow at the National University of Singapore. &#8220;This creates new opportunities for BRICS, at least temporarily.&#8221;
American firms may also seek to move some activities to emerging markets that are within existing trading blocs so as to avoid rising tariffs, he noted.
While many are hopeful for the three-day BRICS summit to advance trade liberalization, divergent policies between members could stand in the way.
&#8220;The challenge for BRICS has always been what exactly holds them together beyond a cute acronym,&#8221; warned Deborah Elms, executive director of the Asian Trade Centre, noting their different domestic structures. &#8220;China is outward looking and manufacturing focused. Brazil is increasingly outward focused, but mostly for agriculture, not manufacturing. India is really not open.&#8221;

The world’s major emerging economies could end up benefiting from global trade tensions

Ashley Turner
Source: <a href="http://https://www.cnbc.com/2018/05/17/after-us-embassy-move-to-jerusalem-more-countries-follow-its-lead.html">After US embassy makes controversial move to Jerusalem, more countries follow its lead</a>
<ul>
<li>The United States on Monday celebrated the opening of its embassy in Jerusalem, making it the first country to make the &#8220;provocative&#8221; move from Tel Aviv.</li>
<li>On Wednesday, Guatemala moved its embassy to the Israeli city. Other countries including Paraguay and Romania are considering the move as well, in spite of the controversy surrounding such decisions. </li>
</ul>
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="http://cnbc.africa/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/105214617-GettyImages-959051118.1910x1000.jpg" alt="(L to R) Sara Netanyahu and her husband Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin applaud as Guatemalan President Jimmy Morales and his wife Hilda Patricia Marroquin cut the ribbon during the inauguration ceremony of the Guatemalan embassy in Jerusalem on May 16, 20" height="1000" width="1910" data-licensor-name="Ronen Zvulun | AFP | Getty Images"/>
The United States received intense international criticism on Monday when it celebrated the opening of its embassy in Jerusalem. It was the first country to make the <a href="https://news.un.org/en/story/2018/05/1009792">&#8220;provocative&#8221;</a> move from Tel Aviv.
But on Wednesday, Guatemala joined the U.S. in moving its embassy to Jerusalem.
More countries are preparing to make the leap. Paraguay&#8216;s Foreign Ministry announced that its embassy will also <a href="http://www.cnbc.com/id/105211378?__source=cnbcafrica|inline|story|&amp;par=cnbcafrica &amp;doc="> 
relocate to Jerusalem 
</a>, while the Czech Republic, Romania and Honduras reportedly considering the move. 
These smaller countries, especially those in Latin America, may be looking to cement good relations with the U.S. in hopes of preserving foreign aid and trading status. Some are also enhancing relationships with Israel, which has courted some of them with aid and even arms sales.
Jonathan Cristol, a fellow at the World Policy Institute, said that he doesn&#8217;t believe the U.S. pressured countries like Guatemala into moving, but the U.S. embassy opening did make it possible for these countries to do so without &#8220;bearing the political cost.&#8221;
The U.S. took a political hit in December when the <a href="http://www.cnbc.com/id/10000938?__source=cnbcafrica|inline|story|&amp;par=cnbcafrica &amp;doc="> 
United Nations 
</a> voted to condemn President Donald Trump&#8216;s decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel&#8217;s capital, which <a href="http://www.cnbc.com/id/104884012?__source=cnbcafrica|inline|story|&amp;par=cnbcafrica &amp;doc="> 
angered leaders throughout the Middle East. 
</a>

<h4>Palestinian protests turn violent</h4>
On Tuesday, the UN Security Council held an emergency meeting that rebuked Israel after its forces killed more than 60 Palestine protesters on the Gaza border the same day the U.S. unveiled its new embassy. Monday also marked the 70th anniversary of Israel&#8217;s founding, a day the Palestinians call Nakba, or Day of Catastrophe. 
Palestinians have been protesting at the Gaza border since March, asserting that they also have a claim on Jerusalem, which has deep significance to the Jewish, Muslim and Christian faiths. 
With the U.S. bearing the brunt of the international blowback, smaller countries that have had historically close ties to Israel are able to consider making their moves, but Cristol said this does not signal a mass relocation of embassies to Jerusalem. 
Countries like Guatemala and Paraguay have something to gain by moving their embassies to Jerusalem. Jon Alterman, a senior vice president and director of the Middle East Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said that Israel has long courted smaller countries. 
&#8220;It has conducted extensive outreach in Africa , for example, and it has ties throughout Latin America,&#8221; Alterman said in an email. 
Cristol said these smaller countries have received developmental assistance or arms sales, so &#8220;they&#8217;ll do better with a close relationship with Israel.&#8221; 
Cristol also noted that Latin American countries, including Guatemala, have Evangelical Christian heads of state, so it is a &#8220;natural inclination&#8221; for those countries to move their embassies to Jerusalem. 
<h4>Evangelical connection</h4>
Some evangelicals believe the transfer of the embassy and the recognition of Jerusalem as Israel&#8217;s capital <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/us-embassy-move-why-trump-jerusalem-tel-aviv-religious-right-christians-jews-evangelicals-rapture-a8352961.html">will help bring about the so-called Rapture</a>, an event in which they believe all Christians, living and dead, will join with God, the Independent wrote.
Evangelical Christians supported Trump&#8217;s decision to relocate the U.S. embassy, <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2017/12/06/politics/american-evangelicals-jerusalem/index.html">according to CNN</a>.
But would larger countries like Russia, China and Netherlands nations make the move? 
&#8220;I would be very surprised,&#8221; Cristol said. &#8220;I would be astounded, frankly, if the major Western European powers, with the possible exception of the United Kingdom, would move their embassies any time soon.&#8221;
Cristol mentioned the UK as a possibility because the current British government is more conservative than other European powers and it &#8220;has a fairly large, but often overlooked, Christian constituency that is highly supportive of Israel,&#8221; he said.
Cristol added that Russia and China are also unlikely candidates. Those countries will continue to do business with Israel regardless of where their embassies are located, he said, &#8220;so why take the risk?&#8221;
If any of them do make future moves to Israel, however, they will need to do what the Trump administration did not do, Alterman said, &#8220;which is to explicitly state that the embassy is located in West Jerusalem and endorse the idea of East Jerusalem becoming the capital of a future Palestinian state.&#8221;
Going forward, Israel will surely encourage more countries to move their embassies, Alterman said.
And for some countries &#8220;on a practical level, Jerusalem is the capitol of Israel,&#8221; Cristol added.
Most Israeli government officials and offices are located in Jerusalem, so countries with embassies in Tel Aviv have to travel to do business.
Relocating to Jerusalem is a smart money move for smaller states, making things more &#8220;effective and efficient,&#8221; Cristol said.
&#8220;Tel Aviv is only about an hour away,&#8221; he added, &#8220;but also sort of a world away.&#8221;
<h4>WATCH: Saudi diplomat on Jerusalem embassy opening</h4>

After US embassy makes controversial move to Jerusalem, more countries follow its lead

Theories about Donald Trump’s colluding with the Russians in the 2016 election are as plentiful as the 128,824,224 people that voted in it. We’ll find out who’s right and wrong soon enough, though.
But guilty or innocent, there’s a big, bad, murderous herd out there that wants to stomp him straight into the ground. The herd is sprawling and on the move, kicking up dust everywhere. And it’s comprised of all kinds of beasts.
Democrats livid at losing the White House and Republicans resentful of losing their party to an outsider. The media. Progressive lawyers and judges. Academia, Hollywood and anyone else who is still raging over a Trump presidency. And they’re all snorting and grunting furiously as they dig their hooves deep into the dirt, readying themselves for an all-out, frenzied impeachment stampede. This will be a spectacle for the ages.
Because trampling Donald Trump is how Chuck Schumer and the rest of the herd plan to retake the White House. You know the old saying; if you can’t beat him, stomp him.
<h3>High stakes Russian roulette</h3>
Incredibly, just five short months into his term, Trump is already facing off in a high-stakes game of Russian roulette with the newly appointed special prosecutor, Robert Mueller. Special prosecutors are wired to find something bad. That’s their job description. And they have few constraints and unlimited resources which make them even deadlier.
Now, as Mueller and Trump sit down at the table, the world anxiously sits on the edge of their seat waiting to see if there’s a bullet in the chamber. But still, Trump needs to have actually broken the law and Mueller needs to prove it. And as Mueller readies his troops, Trump is preparing to do what he’s done for a lifetime in New York. Slug it out. He’s all lawyered up and working the back channels of Washington for whatever support he can muster.
I have to assume, though, that Las Vegas is giving him pretty long odds to win the fight. He has thousands of enemies and few allies. And there are a lot of very angry and powerful bulls in the herd, intent on getting back what they believe is rightfully theirs. And now, they’re outraged as hell and thundering en masse towards the White House.
But whether Trump is impeached or not, just being dragged through an excruciating special investigation in front of the entire world will likely be enough to assure Trump a single-term presidency. Even if he is exonerated, it’s hard to imagine being accused of something as shocking as colluding with the Russians, and then winning reelection in 2020. Today, thanks to social media, if you’re accused of something it’s nearly as good as being guilty of it.
Because the accusation is the headline that people always remember. And unlike the Watergate scandal during Nixon’s presidency, which only appeared on the 6PM evening news and in the morning newspapers, Russia-gate will be in your face, and on your iPhone, around the clock.
<h3>Outrage delivers eyeballs</h3>
So, whether Trump is actually guilty of a crime or not almost doesn’t matter. The herd doesn’t care. They want him gone at any cost and are going to make a lot of noise. Because, here, in the post-truth era, a good outrage story in the news means people are watching and reading. And the media loves that because outrage delivers eyeballs. Watching Chuck Schumer or Tom Perez throw a hissy-fit on CNN or MSNBC over a Trump tweet insulting Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama makes for a great news cycle. Real, fake, or otherwise.
Trump vs. Mueller vs. Russia vs. Comey vs. Flynn vs. the Democrats is the best pure political outrage story since Richard Nixon walked off the cliff in 1974. For the Republicans, if Trump is ultimately impeached, it will be the political equivalent of a nuclear reactor meltdown that makes the surrounding area uninhabitable for decades to come, or even longer. It will render the GOP toxic and unelectable in the 2018 midterms and beyond. And the herd knows it.
<h3>The E.U. is outraged too</h3>
In the middle of all this, and just to keep things interesting, Trump is wreaking havoc on the other side of the Atlantic too. He just flipped the bird to our NATO allies and told them the U.S. is no longer the bank and to pay up what they owe. He’s not actually wrong there, but the delivery could’ve been a little softer. The European Union, in general, is outraged too. After a meeting with Trump the other day, Germany’s Angela Merkel lamented, “The times when we could fully rely on others are finished.” Then she added that the Europeans “needed to take our fate into our own hands.”
Closer to home, Mexico and Canada are watching anxiously as NAFTA hangs in the balance. Right about now, Justin Trudeau and Enrique Peña Nieto probably see Trump like the scary new neighbor who just moved in next door who they suspect might be a serial killer.
So, all is not well for Donald Trump. I don’t see how he can possibly win this fight. Guilty or not, he’s going to be publically gutted in the process and will be damaged goods not only in the U.S., but on the world stage as well. Unfortunately, history will remember him as the proverbial bad guy &#8211; the villain dressed in all black with the handle-bar moustache and the six-shooter. That story is already being written. Right or wrong, true or false.
So, the herd is growing and on the march. And irrespective of the outcome, just by virtue of going through an investigation, or worse, a possible impeachment process, the U.S. is headed down a jagged and slippery slope that, in the end, will only serve to further cleave the country in two.
Author: David S. Levin, Managing Partner, Nexus Capital Markets, LLC
&nbsp;

Op-Ed: Stomping Trump out of the White House

Ken Dilanian, Peter Alexander and Courtney Kube
<div class="embed-container image">
<div class="caption">White House senior advisor Jared Kushner (C) sits alongside U.S. President Donald Trump (L) and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross (2nd L) as they prepare to meet with Saudi Arabia&#8217;s King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud and the Saudi delegation at the Royal Court in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia May 20, 2017.</div>
</div>
<div class="group">
<a href="http://www.cnbc.com/jared-kushner/" target="_self">Jared Kushner</a>, <a href="http://www.cnbc.com/donald-trump/" target="_self">the president</a>&#8216;s son-in-law and one of his senior advisers, has come under FBI scrutiny in the Russia investigation, multiple U.S. officials told NBC News.
Investigators believe Kushner has significant information relevant to their inquiry, officials said. That does not mean they suspect him of a crime or intend to charge him.
The FBI&#8217;s scrutiny of Kushner places the bureau&#8217;s sprawling counterintelligence and criminal investigation not only on the doorstep of the White House, but on the cusp of the Trump family circle. The Washington Post first reported last week that <a class="inline_asset" title="http://www.cnbc.com/2017/05/19/a-white-house-official-close-to-trump-is-a-significant-person-of-interest-in-russia-probe-wapo.html" href="http://www.cnbc.com/2017/05/19/a-white-house-official-close-to-trump-is-a-significant-person-of-interest-in-russia-probe-wapo.html" target="_self">a senior White House official close to Trump was a &#8220;person of interest,&#8221;</a> but did not name the person. The term &#8220;person of interest&#8221; has no legal meaning.
<a class="inline_asset" title="http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/jared-kushner-now-under-fbi-scrutiny-russia-probe-say-officials-n764826" href="http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/jared-kushner-now-under-fbi-scrutiny-russia-probe-say-officials-n764826" target="_self">Read the full NBC News report here.</a>
</div>

Jared Kushner Now Under FBI Scrutiny in Russia Probe, Say Officials: NBC

&nbsp;
It’s certainly a brave new world we’re living in these days. Back in 2016, Donald Trump set off a barge-full of booming red, white and blue fireworks all over the U.S. and won the White House to everyone’s surprise. Including his own. Not to mention, the GOP won control of both houses of Congress, 33 governorships and 32 state legislatures as well.
But the Republicans shouldn’t get too comfortable. Because irrespective of Trump’s victory, they need to remember one small detail. He was not their Plan A. He wasn’t even their Plan B or C. Plan A, the usual assortment of stiff blue suits with frozen smiles failed miserably as Trump plowed through candidate after candidate like Godzilla demolishing Tokyo in one of those old 1960’s Japanese movies. And, in the end, after disposing of Hillary Clinton, he slipped in through the back door of the White House and became President of the United States while both the Democrats and Republicans slept soundly in their beds.
But Trump’s election, irrespective of appearances, is not necessarily the beginning of a trend or movement as you’ve probably been reading. Rather, it is quite possibly the end of one. The last gasp of the aging, Eurocentric, predominantly white, hierarchy in America. His message resonated loudly in 2016 for sure within the present makeup of the electorate. But that’s all changing. And looking out a few election cycles from now, there are two very powerful demographic forces coming together that are forming, as mariners say, the “perfect storm”. The passing of the generational torch from the Baby Boomers to the Millennials and the ongoing influx of immigrants from Latin America, Asia and elsewhere. When combined, this new demographic will ultimately tilt the balance of power to the Democrats for the foreseeable future &#8211; or maybe longer. And the Republicans are sailing right into its monstrous waves with no plan to defend against it.
In the U.S., the Baby Boomers, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/11/08/us/politics/election-exit-polls.html?_r=0">53% of which supported Trump and the Republicans</a>, are starting to cede control to the Millennials as they continue to age and their numbers begin to decrease through natural attrition. <a href="https://www.census.gov/prod/2014pubs/p25-1141.pdf">Approximately eight to ten million Boomers are expected to die by the presidential election in 2028 and roughly another eight million by the following election in 2032</a>. That’s nearly 25% of the Baby Boomer generation in the next 15 years. This will ultimately prove to be insurmountable for the Republicans. Although the Democrats will suffer proportionate losses as well, the more liberal Millennials will fill their ranks as they are more in line ideologically with their parents. Already, they are tied with the Boomers as the largest generation in the U.S. and will easily surpass them by the next election. And if you want to look out further, according to Pew Research, by 2050 the Millennials will account for roughly 80% of the electorate.
So, for Republicans, these statistics should give them real cause for concern. As the number of Republican Baby Boomers shrink, it cannot be assumed that they will automatically be replaced on a one-to-one basis by younger Republican voters. Because their children, many of which are Millennials, have very different and more liberal views of race, gender issues, gay rights, foreign relations and the role of government in their lives than their more conservative parents did. They are not traditional Republicans and are breaking with the Party’s political machine. Accordingly, as time goes on, many of their votes will start to shift to the left. In addition, the ranks of the Democrats and Independents are still growing due to the influx of Millennial age immigrants, many of which will ultimately be granted citizenship and thus the ability to vote. And these new citizens are spreading out across the U.S. as well which, in time, will alter the Electoral College map. So as the base number of Democrats continues to build and the number of Republicans decline, a broad ideological shift will start to unfold and change U.S. politics for decades to come. America will transform itself from the traditional center-right ideology of the Baby Boomers to the center-left politics of the Millennials.
None of this was lost on Barack Obama who pushed for increased immigration for years. He understood the impact that immigrants would have on the country’s profile &#8211; and politics – beyond his presidency. So much so that the U.S. granted over <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/11/08/us/politics/election-exit-polls.html?_r=0">5,000,000 immigrants new citizenship</a> during Obama’s presidency. And while not every citizen in the U.S. actually votes, historically, most new citizens tend to vote Democratic as they typically lean on large government programs and entitlements that the Democrats support.
So, to the Republicans, I ask you this: what’s your plan to stay relevant as the country around you changes? What is your message to these more ethnically diverse, liberal voters? Make no mistake, the message that got Donald Trump elected won’t work for much longer. Certainly, not with these younger voters. Much of the Republican platform is rooted in an ideology based on ideas from generations gone by.
So how progressive are they willing to become in order to have a chance at running the country in the years ahead? It seems clear to me that, to start with, they will need to dramatically broaden their philosophical tent from the standpoint of race, gender and age diversity. Positions on issues like immigration and international relations will need to mirror the shifting views of these new voters. And they will need to field younger, more diverse candidates who will appeal to these more culturally and socially diverse Americans.
I’m not looking to write the Republican Party’s eulogy prematurely. But Trump was a product of a moment in time. He was the exception, not the rule. And just as the Democrats had an extremely rude wake-up call when Trump won the White House, the alarm clock is about to go off for the Republicans too. I just hope that this time around, they don’t sleep through it as they did when Trump hoodwinked the entire Republican Party and became the nominee. Because if they do, they will be on the outside looking in for decades to come.
And Donald Trump could well be the last Republican president the U.S. has for a very, very long time.
Or, quite possibly, forever.

The Republicans’ last gasp. A contrarian view.

Millions of Americans, especially those in the Washington establishment, woke up on Wednesday feeling shocked and hurt by the surprise election of Donald Trump to the White House. But like every failure or painful turn in life, it will mean nothing and lead to nothing but hurt feelings unless these wounded Americans learn a real lesson today and become tomorrow&#8217;s wise. To do that, they must accept and learn the real reason Trump won.
First, they need to ignore the prevailing angry explanations that are all off the mark. The first incorrect reason many of us began hearing well before Election Day was that Trump was being bolstered by overt racists and more nuanced &#8220;alt-right&#8221; haters who were acting like a springboard after eight years of an African-American in the Oval Office. That theory went further to insist that Trump&#8217;s hard-line stance against illegal Mexican immigrants invigorated a nascent nativist hatred movement.
But the facts simply didn&#8217;t bear that out throughout the election and now we know that even more based on the fact that Trump did five points better than Mitt Romney among black voters and two points better among Latinos. Trump&#8217;s victory is simply not the result of some kind of burgeoning race war.
&#8220;This is a divide that truly began in America during the Vietnam War, which was protested and defended by the rich and upper middle class while the lower middle class and poor actually did the fighting in country. That divide and the wounds from it have never really healed.&#8221;
The second reason many people have been using as a crutch against the real reason for Trump&#8217;s victory is sexism. Many of us are being led to believe that, in the end, too many American voters just wouldn&#8217;t vote for Hillary Clinton because she&#8217;s a woman. There&#8217;s probably no way to prove this is false via statistics. But based on what most of us saw and heard on social media and elsewhere throughout the election, it sure seems like more people voted for Clinton because she&#8217;s a woman rather than the other way around. Moreover, if the morose Left would just try to find a silver lining in all of this today it might realize that Clinton&#8217;s gender never really played much of a role at all in this election for the overwhelming majority of Americans. A glass ceiling has indeed been broken when it comes to the way voters think. That should not be forgotten or missed.
The last wrong explanation for Clinton&#8217;s loss is one people both on the Left and the Right are making: The Clinton email scandal. Of course, the continuing cloud of the on again/off again FBI investigation into Clinton&#8217;s illegal private email server didn&#8217;t help her campaign. But it always served as one of those fake reasons people give for not voting for someone they just never were going to support anyway. That is not to say the use of the server wasn&#8217;t reckless and serious, but Clinton&#8217;s fate was sealed long before most Americans had ever really learned of the scandal or knew the name &#8220;James Comey.&#8221;
Nope, the real reasons Trump won have been real in America for at least the last 40 or so years. They are all the same reasons I finally recognized five-plus months ago when I first realized he was headed to victory. It&#8217;s simple: The largest single economic group in our country has been sold out and ignored by the leaders of both parties for more than a generation. They are the hourly wage-earning Americans who have been bounced around from good manufacturing jobs, to service jobs, to seasonal work without the rest of us noticing that much. And that&#8217;s even though there are a lot more of them than the college-educated white collar office workers out there. You know the financial uncertainty you felt last night when you saw the Dow futures crash down by 750 points? That&#8217;s the kind of emotion millions of your fellow Americans have been feeling every night for years even though they&#8217;re not &#8220;poor&#8221; or even necessarily unemployed.
These are the people who have been the acceptable sacrifices for our trade and wage-deflating immigration policies that do boost our economy overall &#8230; just not for them. These are the people who have been scoffed at for not choosing to go to college, even though doing so has become an exercise in playing a game of &#8220;economic chicken&#8221; with student loans and irrelevant skills.
And it goes beyond economics. This is a divide that truly began in America during the Vietnam War, which was protested and defended by the rich and upper middle class while the lower middle class and poor actually did the fighting in country. That divide and the wounds from it have never really healed. I doubt we&#8217;ll ever see an exit poll this specific, but I&#8217;d be willing to bet that Trump won 60 percent plus of the Vietnam veterans&#8217; vote because he spoke to their past and current pain in a way actual Vietnam vets like John Kerry and John McCain — guys who actually served in the war — never could.
Since Trump can&#8217;t affect positive changes for this group of long-ignored Americans without help, it&#8217;s imperative that Democrats and Republicans get acquainted, really acquainted, with the people who elected him.
Hillary Clinton and the 16 Republicans who lost to Trump in the primaries failed because they really have thought of this group of people as &#8220;deplorables.&#8221; Clinton was just the unlucky one who got caught saying so.
The good news is that this is not a segment of the population that relies on welfare or needs new government handouts. In fact, just knowing that someone in Washington is finally listening to them and not writing them off as racists or Neanderthals will be an amazing start. And the politicians and other establishment types who do the most and best listening over the next four years will be the ones who move this country the most forward and reap the most rewards.﻿

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