On November 9, the Intermarium Institute held the second meeting of its recently founded discussion club. This time, experts summarized the results of the presidential elections in the USA and predicted what can be expected from the new administration of D. Trump.

The following were present at the event: Mykola Volhov – political consultant, Ihor Chalenko – political scientist, Oleh Posternak – political technologist, as well as the team of the Intermarium Institute – Yuriy Gavrylechko and Volodymyr Volia. The event was moderated by Valentyn Haidai, director of the Intermarium Institute.

The first to speak was political technologist Oleh Posternak, who over the past year gave a number of comments to the Intermarium Institute specifically on the subject of the American elections. In particular, characterizing the 2024 election campaign in the USA, the expert noted:

"The most vivid and large-scale election campaign of the beginning of the 21st century, which recorded the "right turn" of American society. Technologically, Harris and Trump's campaigns are not particularly different from classic election campaigns that followed all the canons of political marketing in the USA. But this time the scale of campaigning, budget records and emotional antagonism are impressive.

In this campaign, you could see standard campaigning measures - posters near houses, candidate rallies, debates, micro-targeted advertising, sending emails, attracting Hollywood stars, visiting voters' homes, walking around neighborhoods with a megaphone, mobile applications with information about the voter's political position, interviews of politicians with famous journalists, publication of memoirs with scandalous details.

At the same time, the campaign is distinguished by certain features. The use of conventional and digital advertising in social media is unprecedented. In this presidential election, YouTube ads targeting the non-political audience, or what I call the "silent voter", are breaking records. The most scandalous technology was Elon Musk's lottery. And it should be said separately that this particular election breaks records for the massive use of generative artificial intelligence in elections: promotion in social media, vivid deepfakes, phone calls with the voice of stars and politicians, graphical depiction of a large number of supporters at rallies."

Volodymyr Volia, strategic research coordinator of the Intermarium Institute, noted that the US elections have become a competition to attract swing voters. The Democratic Party lost that race. Including due to the fact that she paid a lot of attention to foreign policy issues, although for 66% of respondents, as shown by the exit poll, priority issues are economy and democracy. Also, according to the exit poll, 68% expressed dissatisfaction with the activities of the Biden administration. Nationwide public opinion polls capture the sentiments of all elections - those who vote and those who do not. And the exit poll is essentially similar to a blitz referendum among those voters who vote. That is, it is quite obvious that American voters are dissatisfied with Biden's rule due to the deterioration of their own socio-economic well-being (life has become more expensive). This happened under the influence of: a) the pandemic; b) a significant increase in the price of energy resources in 2021-2022 as a result of Putin's aggressive policy. Trump promised jobs and income.

As for the foreign policy of the new presidency of D. Trump, it is "certain uncertainty" regarding Russia and Ukraine, as well as the threat of consolidation of all opponents and enemies of America. For example, Trump and his team may reconsider their position on the Russian-Ukrainian war. And a large-scale intervention of oil from the USA at low prices on world markets can become a declaration of a trade war not only for Russia, but also for all the oil-producing states of the world, most of the oil-producing companies. This can contribute to the creation of a fairly broad informal anti-American coalition - "against Trump".

Ihor Chalenko, political scientist:

"The 2024 American election campaign was marked not only by the earth-shattering return of Donald Trump to the White House. She recorded a serious loss of support from American voters for the Democratic Party and its candidate. If the Republican candidate Trump actually confirmed his result in 2020 with a little more than 74 million votes, then Harris's loss in relation to Biden amounted to more than 11 million votes. In the indirect election system, this is not of primary importance, but it emphasizes the level of success in mobilizing candidates' supporters and the conditional "swamp".

The key to the success of the Trump campaign was to study the mistakes that were made in the pre-debate period of the presidential candidates and before. Republicans moved away from focusing exclusively on their core and maneuvered toward the center. In October, the "elephants" were able to impose their agenda on the current vice president, to create a sufficient field for the mobilization of uncharacteristic electoral niches for Republicans, such as Latin Americans or Muslims. Communication with young people through social networks and podcasts was also qualitatively worked out.

The real technological success was the debate at the level of the vice-presidential candidates, where the role of conditional weirdos was rejected from the Trump team. In contrast, the Democrats' bet on postal early voting did not pay off, as a significant number of votes went to Trump as the opposition candidate.

The American elections will have a serious impact on the further course of the Russian-Ukrainian war, with increasing chances of finding a solution to its swift end. At the same time, one of the scenarios is that Trump will be disappointed in the actual unwillingness of the Russian aggressor to agree on the Ukrainian issue on a compromise basis, which will result in the revival of the Lend-Lease case for Ukraine. A one-party majority in both houses of the US Congress will help advance this idea".

Mykola Volgov made the following conclusions from the 2024 elections:

"The future style of a politician's decision-making can be determined by the election campaign. Trump's campaign turned out to be surprisingly effective, despite numerous scandals, legal problems and accusations. This became possible thanks to the extraordinary personal faith of the candidate in his own success, selectivity and willingness to take decisive non-standard steps for the ultimate goal. A very small percentage of politicians are capable of such a risk. But those who are ready to do so have an extremely wide arsenal of tools at their disposal.

Against this background, the vanilla-lactose-free politeness of the Democrat Harris looked like a toothless mess before defeat. She has not proven her ability to achieve results either now or in a hypothetical presidential seat. While the "bad boy" Trump behaved as if he had already won. First of all, this added to the campaign the necessary conflict that always increases the turnout. After all, participation in elections becomes interesting even for a deep electoral "swamp". So Donald managed to dive to the bottom of it and pull out the world of God's deeply "sleeping" Republican voter.

The concept of inheritance is very important to American political culture. Not in the Ukrainian sense, in the form of a lifetime annuity for feeding all children and household members. And as a recognition of the actor's contribution to the development of the country, the influence on the processes, which will remain even after he leaves the big game. Such a vain and ambitious character will certainly devote his last term in the White House to its formation. Moreover, he will have the support of the Republican majority in Congress for the first two years.

For Ukraine, the key question is whether Trump wants to remain in history: a "peacemaker" or a "winner." Both are a good image for communicating with American society. But his strategy towards Russia depends on it. The only thing that does not cause doubts is the style of its implementation. So everyone fasten your seat belts. Hurricane "Donald" is gaining momentum".

Yuriy Gavrylechko, expert of the Intermarium Institute on economic and political issues, focused his speech on three points:

"1. Trump made a bet on the American dream - "everyone can succeed if they make an effort." His opponents bet on paternalism of the communist variety - "the state will help you, because you are worth it." As it turned out, Americans are more willing to work to improve their own lives and increase well-being than to use their own money to give others the opportunity to live carefree and do nothing. Trump appealed to archetypes and traditional values ​​and, as a result, won the votes of those who did not vote for him in the previous election, including Hispanics and a large portion of Muslims. Creativity and virtuality, multiplied by the socialist ideas proposed by the Democrats, lost to the archetypes of liberalism that Trump relied on. In addition, dissatisfied with the experiments of the Democrats, the Americans made their choice in favor of the "old faces". If you look at the personal composition of the elected US parliament, you have to admit that professional politicians and people known for their views were elected to the Senate and Congress. From both camps, Republicans and Democrats. Spartz, Pelosi... and dozens more who have already been congressmen or senators and more than once.

2. Even those who closely followed the presidential race in the US are unlikely to be able to remember the main slogan of the Harris campaign or its main economic proposals for both ordinary Americans and corporations. The Democrats concentrated on criticizing Trump, and not on their own program and its promotion, apparently neglecting the fact that for the last 4 years they had their own president and majority in the parliament. Instead, Trump with his "America First!" - recognizable and understandable. And his promises to reduce the income tax for American corporations whose production is located in the USA from 21% to 15%, as well as to remove the limits for tax deductions from taxes already paid by citizens, now the limit is 10,000 US dollars - found their addressee among target audiences.
3. Trump is the leader of all US presidents in terms of fulfilling his campaign promises. 60% completion is a record. So his second term will be quite predictable, no matter how strange it may seem to some".

Summarizing the results of the second meeting of the discussion club, the director of the Intermarium Institute, Valentyn Haidai, noted that now - before Trump's inauguration as president of the USA, one should definitely not believe the various information that is available in the media and, especially, in social networks, even if this information from supposedly influential media, political figures, etc. Now, and after Trump's inauguration, there will be a lot of known false information about the intentions of the new administration in the USA regarding plans for Ukraine, the end of the war, etc. This information will be disseminated by various political circles for the purpose of lobbying for certain goals, ideas, strategies, as well as by provocateurs for disinformation, misunderstanding, and disbelief. Therefore, for now, it is necessary to keep calm and trust only verified and/or official sources.

Regarding D. Trump himself, V. Haidai noted:

"Undoubtedly, this is the most vivid political déjà vu not only of America, but also of the world's political community, at least in recent decades. I cannot imagine in recent history such a bright and triumphant return to power of a political figure, from whom part of the team turned away before that, blocked in social networks, forgotten by the mass media, and now he is returning to the White House with a taste for revenge.

This is Trump's second but last presidential term. And, as has been repeatedly noted today, it is important who Trump wants to be - a peacemaker or a winner? We cannot unequivocally make judgments about his plans for Ukraine. It can be assumed that the way it was under the old Biden administration is unlikely to be. This does not necessarily mean worse or better. Therefore, I want to emphasize once again that you should not make premature conclusions and trust dubious information. But what can be said for sure? Trump supports Israel and at one time opposed the nuclear deal with Iran. This gives reason to believe that the new administration may more actively support Israel and weaken Iran, which is a de facto ally of Russia. Everyone also knows about Trump's sanctions wars against China and the attempt to establish contact with North Korea. In the context of the possible deployment of the North Korean military to the war zone and comprehensive cooperation between China and Russia, the steps taken by the Trump administration in the Asian theater to curb Beijing and Pyongyang may also have positive consequences for Ukraine, since we are again talking about Russia's allies. Therefore, even if aid to Ukraine will not be a priority or will be significantly revised by the administration of D. Trump, he can deal a blow (political, diplomatic, economic) to Russia's allies - Iran, North Korea and China, and this is also beneficial to us.