Watergate, exacerbated by economic woes like the oil crisis and inflation, derailed this agenda, empowering Congress and the courts to constrain the presidency through laws like the Impoundment Control Act and judicial rulings that bolstered bureaucratic independence.
Fifty years later, Donald Trump's second term—inaugurated in 2025 after surviving impeachments, indictments, and a "Russia Hoax"—appears to resurrect and complete Nixon's unfinished vision. Facing similar establishment resistance, Trump is methodically implementing policies that echo Nixon's thwarted plans for executive dominance, bureaucratic reform, and protectionist economics, delayed but not denied by history's intervening scandals.
At the core of Nixon's second-term blueprint was a quest to subdue the "administrative state"—the unelected bureaucracy he saw as a Democratic stronghold thwarting presidential mandates.
Nixon aimed to reorganize cabinet departments, consolidate independent agencies under White House control, and reassign or punish career civil servants who resisted his policies, viewing his reelection as a mandate for "revenge" against first-term opponents.
He pioneered the "administrative presidency," bypassing Congress via executive actions to centralize domestic policy.
Watergate aborted this, leading to post-resignation reforms that entrenched civil service protections and limited impoundment—the presidential refusal to spend congressionally appropriated funds.
Congress "waged war" against Nixon, as Justice Elena Kagan later described, winning with the 1974 Impoundment Control Act and Burger Court decisions like Train v. City of New York, which curtailed executive discretion.
Trump, like Nixon, entered his second term decrying a "deep state" of disloyal bureaucrats.
Reviving Nixon's playbook, he has pushed Schedule F, reclassifying tens of thousands of senior civil servants as at-will employees, enabling mass firings of perceived adversaries—a direct parallel to Nixon's plans for bureaucratic purges.
Where Nixon impounded funds to restrain spending and assert control, sparking congressional backlash, Trump has canceled billions in foreign aid and domestic programs, testing impoundment limits with judicial backing from a conservative Roberts Court.
Recent rulings, such as Department of State v. AIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition, shield executive spending decisions from private lawsuits, effectively dismantling post-Watergate barriers Nixon couldn't overcome.
Trump's early executive actions to shrink federal agencies and install loyalists mirror Nixon's aborted reorganization efforts, positioning the presidency to dominate policy without bureaucratic interference.
This "taming" of the administrative state fulfills Nixon's dream of a responsive executive branch, unhindered by what he called an "unwieldy" federal workforce.
Economically, both leaders wielded tariffs as blunt instruments to jolt global trade and prioritize American workers, defying free-trade orthodoxy. Nixon's 1971 "Nixon Shock" imposed a 10% surcharge on all imports, suspending dollar convertibility to gold, to combat inflation, trade deficits, and foreign economic predation—actions that reshaped the global order but were cut short by his downfall.
This protectionism echoed his first-term wage-price controls and revenue-sharing to empower states over federal overreach.
Trump's tariffs—up to 54% on imports from over 180 countries, including 25% on Canada and Mexico—evoke this shock therapy, aiming to balance deficits and revive manufacturing.
Critics decry the inflationary risks, much like the 1970s stagflation that plagued Nixon, but Trump presses on, coupling tariffs with deregulation and tax cuts to unleash growth—extending Nixon's "New Federalism" vision of devolving power while protecting U.S. sovereignty.
Both faced retaliation and economic turbulence, yet their unilateralism signals a delayed completion of Nixon-era economic nationalism.
In foreign policy, Nixon's realpolitik—ending Vietnam via Paris Accords, opening China, and resupplying Israel during the Yom Kippur War—prioritized U.S. interests over ideology, even amid oil shocks.
His resignation left these initiatives vulnerable, with successors like Ford and Carter unable to fully capitalize. Trump echoes this pragmatic toughness: avoiding new wars, brokering Middle East deals, and confronting China—not with Nixon's engagement, but with trade wars and tech decoupling that build on Nixon's foundational shift from containment to competition.
Trump's "America First" tariffs and alliances, like NATO pressure, extend Nixon's legacy of using economic leverage for geopolitical gains, delayed by decades of globalization Nixon inadvertently accelerated.
Nixon and Trump share disruptor traits: anti-media rhetoric, appeals to the "silent majority" (or MAGA base), and vows of vengeance against elites.
Watergate's legacy—ethics laws, independent counsels—mirrors indictments Trump overcame, empowering him to erode those very constraints.
Where Nixon fell to scandal, Trump's resilience allows him to finish the job: a presidency unbound, bureaucracy reined in, economy protected. This "delayed second term" isn't mere coincidence; it's historical vindication, with Trump's actions—bolstered by a sympathetic judiciary—realizing Nixon's mandate after 50 years of bureaucratic entrenchment.
The risks are high—inflation, institutional backlash—but so was Nixon's vision, now unfolding in Trump's America.
Editorial comments expressed in this column are the sole opinion of the writer
