PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — Every new president faces challenges starting a new term, and Donald Trump is in for some big ones: national security, the environment, a personnel shortage in the armed forces.
The once and future president has promised to steer the government in a more conservative direction and overturn what the Republican Party calls "the woke agenda."
The U.S. Senate must approve all of Trump's major appointments. And there have been signs from some Senate Republicans of opposition to some of Trump's nominees.
On one front, it appears opposition to the nomination of Robert Kennedy Jr. to lead the Department of Health and Human Services has been fading, because he's changed his focus from vaccine skepticism to processed foods.
Confirmation hearings will begin soon, among the first jobs of three new senators: Pennsylvania Republican David McCormick, New Jersey Democrat Andy Kim, and Delaware Democrat Lisa Blunt Rochester.
Also, he will have to manage all of this with a tiny GOP advantage in the U.S. House and a not-so-subtle warning from the U.S. Supreme Court to all levels of government not to challenge or refuse to obey court decisions.
In a key area, Trump will propose large corporate tax cuts, along with cuts for wealthier taxpayers.
This week, I talked to seven political leaders, Democrats and Republicans, in Pennsylvania and New Jersey, who are hoping that Trump II will pay attention to voting blocks among lower- and middle-class Americans that helped him win the election.
These voters are hurting, and looking for solutions to the problems that keep housing, health care and economic opportunity out of their reach. And government statistics show the middle class vanishing, because in some parts of the country inflation is still too high.
Trump also has an enormous deportation agenda — but already Pennsylvania Republican decisionmakers are concerned that Trump is compromising on his immigration policy, among reports that he has accepted a recommendation from key advisor Elon Musk that the White House exempt foreign nationals working in the high-tech industry from being deported.
In Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware, political leaders are asking if the incoming administration will do the same for farmers, who depend on a large population of immigrant workers to make fruits, vegetables, dairy, poultry, beef and other agricultural products available to the American public.
We need high tech. We also need to eat.
That issue should be decided in these early days of the new year, before the inauguration.