President Donald Trump is currently championing policies that he believes will bring about a "golden age" for the United States.
His political platform is reinforced by a number of traditional Democratic policies, according to Fox News Digital.
In a February address to a conference of Republican governors, Trump emphasized the importance of prioritizing America and common sense in policy-making. "In everything we do, were putting America first, because the Republican Party is now known as the party of common sense. Its the party of common sense. Very important. I think its a very important phrase for you to use. Its all about common sense. Were conservative, and, you know, were a lot of things, but most important thing is we have to use common sense," he stated.
Despite being vilified by liberals and media pundits as a "threat to democracy" and likened to Adolf Hitler, Trump has, four months into his administration, introduced policies and expressed support for issues that Democrats have long championed during campaigns and in Congress.
On Monday, Trump, accompanied by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and other health officials, signed an executive order aimed at reducing drug prices by up to 80%. The order instructs the U.S. Trade Representative and Secretary of Commerce to ensure that foreign countries do not engage in practices that deliberately and unfairly undercut market prices and cause price hikes in the United States.
"The principle is simple whatever the lowest price paid for a drug in other developed countries, that is the price that Americans will pay," Trump declared during the signing ceremony at the White House. "Some prescription drug and pharmaceutical prices will be reduced almost immediately by 50 to 80 to 90%."
Trump further stated that the U.S. would no longer subsidize the healthcare of foreign countries. "Starting today, the United States will no longer subsidize the healthcare of foreign countries, which is what we were doing. We're subsidizing others healthcare, the countries where they paid a small fraction of what for the same drug that what we pay many, many times more for and will no longer tolerate profiteering and price-gouging from Big Pharma," he said.
As reported by Fox News Digital, Trump's executive order effectively imposes price controls on pharmaceuticals. This approach to lowering prescription drug prices through control measures and government intervention has been a key aspect of Democratic platforms. For instance, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders pledged during his 2020 presidential campaign to reduce such prices by 50% if elected.
Trump celebrated the executive order as a victory against "price gouging" by "Big Pharma," an industry he claimed had been shielded by Democrats until his administration. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., son of Democratic Attorney General Robert Kennedy and nephew of former Democratic President John F. Kennedy, lauded the Trump administration for fulfilling the promise to lower drug prices, a promise he claimed Democrats had been making for decades without action.
Sanders, in response to Trump's executive order, agreed with the president's sentiment about Americans paying "the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs," but warned that the executive order could be overturned by the courts. He urged Trump to support his upcoming legislation to address drug prices.
The White House praised Trump's adoption of policies typically advocated by Democrats, stating that Trump has transformed the GOP "to again become the party of the working class." White House spokesman Kush Desai said, "President Trump oversaw a historic transformation of the GOP to again become the party of the working class. While Democrats spent decades talking about helping everyday Americans, President Trump is actually delivering revealing Democrats incompetence and corruption in the process."
Late on Friday, House Republicans released part of Trump's tax agenda, which includes an expansion of the child tax credit, a policy long favored by Democrats. Trump's team had previously stated during the campaign that the president would consider a "significant expansion of the child tax credit that applies to American families."
Trump also diverged from traditional Republican ideology by expressing a willingness to increase taxes on wealthier Americans as part of a "redistribution" effort. "People would love to do it. Rich people. I would love to do it, frankly. Giving us something up top in order to make people in the middle income and the lower income brackets [have] more. So, it's really a redistribution," Trump said last week.
Trump's openness to taxing the wealthy has been a rallying cry for many Democrats, who argue that it could help reduce income inequality. This sentiment was echoed in the 2020 federal and down-ballot elections, including former President Joe Biden's 2020 presidential campaign.
Trump, who was a registered Democrat for periods of his life, has also garnered support from a number of former Democrats, such as Kennedy and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard. Both Kennedy and Gabbard endorsed Trump during the campaign cycle, with Kennedy registering as an Independent last year during his own presidential campaign and Gabbard registering as a Republican.
Trump's policies and his assertion that the Republican Party has become the "common sense" party reflect his commitment to putting America first. "In everything we do, were putting America first, because the Republican Party is now known as the party of common sense. Its the party of common sense. Very important. I think its a very important phrase for you to use. Its all about common sense. Were conservative, and, you know, were a lot of things, but most important thing is we have to use common sense," Trump reiterated in his February address to the nation's Republican governors.
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