U.S. President Donald Trump inaugurated his presidency with an incendiary speech. Image: Reuters

by Guillermo Alvarado

The president of the United States, Donald Trump, inaugurated his presidency with an incendiary speech in which he reiterated many of the ideas he had expressed during the campaign, and was greeted with fierce applause by the most conservative sectors of that power.

The militarization of the southern border, the largest deportation of illegal immigrants in history, the restoration of the Panama Canal, and putting the interests of his country above all other considerations marked the first speech of the new head of the White House.

As is his wont, he used messianic and bombastic terms such as "the golden age of the United States begins right now" or "we will once again build the strongest army the world has ever seen" to outline the main features of his administration.

Some analysts suggested that the real estate magnate was ushering in a new version of manifest destiny, the idea that power is destined by divine providence to spread everywhere.

Among the first reactions, the NGO Oxfam said that an oligarchy of billionaires was on the horizon.

As an example, the institution cited the existence of a billionaire president, backed by the richest man on the planet, Elon Musk, who directs the destinies of the world's largest economy, which it said is a serious danger to democracy.

This oligarchy, or rather plutocracy, is made up of some of the wealthiest people whose fortunes, as Oxfam points out, grew by two trillion dollars last year, while in the rest of the world many countries are struggling to erase the traces left by the Covid-19 pandemic.

In this regard, it must be said that in the "democracy" of the United States, it is practically impossible for a person with few or medium resources to enter the White House, because this is a task that requires millions of dollars in expenses.

The outgoing president himself, Joseph Biden, who is also a multimillionaire, lamented the mix of financial and political interests of the new administration, as well as the emergence of an unprecedented technological-military complex.

The gross domestic product of the northern power grew by 3.1 percent in the third quarter of 2024, but this was not felt by the population, where inequalities and poverty are growing, an issue that, by the way, was not discussed in depth in the first speech of this nation.