What will the second term of a presidency under Donald Trump mean for Black Americans in terms of federal policy?
While many believe the popular Affordable Care Act — and the expansion of health insurance access and consumer protections that have come along with it — will once again be targeted for repeal by President-Elect Trump, such a move would likely face stiff bipartisan resistance in Congress.
Here are five areas where Trump has laid out explicit changes he seeks to make to existing policy and where the executive branch has the power to see them through.
- Tariffs will be costly for consumers
Trump said repeatedly during the campaign that he intends to increase tariffs on imported goods from foreign countries in an effort to keep American manufacturers competitive.
Economists say such tariffs would likely raise prices for American consumers and disproportionately hurt lower earners, reported CNBC. The typical U.S. household would pay significantly more annually on clothing, furniture, food, appliances and other goods.
The universal 20% universal tariff and 60% levy on Chinese goods that Trump has proposed would raise costs by $2,600 to $3,000 in 2025 for the average U.S. household, according to an October analysis by the Tax Policy Center.
Higher prices for imported goods might also lead to lower consumer demand, cut into business profits and lead to layoffs, said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s.
In June, the Tax Foundation estimated Trump’s tariff plan would shrink U.S. employment by 684,000 full-time jobs.
“It’s bad for consumers,” said Zandi. “It’s a tax on consumers in the form of higher prices for imported goods. … It’s inflationary.”
U.S. tariffs on imported goods could also spark trade wars internationally.
In Trump’s first term, the European Union, China, Canada and other governments put tariffs on American soybeans, whiskey, orange juice and motorcycles, causing some U.S. exports to plummet, noted The New York Times. Foreign governments are likely to jack up costs on American products once again in response to Trump’s tariffs.
- 2. Student loan debt relief is likely to be curtailed.
For Americans repaying federal student loans, don’t expect the Trump administration to continue President Joe Biden’s recent efforts to forgive or steeply reduce loan debt.
Over the past four years, Biden’s executive actions have wiped out roughly $175 billion in student loan forgiveness for nearly five million borrowers, reported NerdWallet.
That includes Biden’s “plan B” for broad student loan forgiveness of up to $20,000 per borrower, which currently faces legal challenges in Republican-led states. The incoming Trump administration has the power to sway the appeals process over those lawsuits, and could also instruct the Education Department to scratch the program entirely.
Also at risk are the 8 million federal student loan borrowers enrolled in Biden’s SAVE program, in which about 4.6 million owe $0 payments based on their income. That program also faces legal challenges, and current SAVE borrowers can forgo payments through April 2025 as the cases play out.
Trump is likely to support the dissolution of SAVE in favor of other existing income-driven repayment (IDR) plans that require students to repay more of the loan. Project 2025, the conservative Heritage Foundation’s 900-page plan to reshape the federal government that Trump’s allies have touted as the incoming administration’s playbook, is critical of loan forgiveness plans that reduce student debt to zero.
A family of four that earns $50,000 a year would have a $0 monthly payment under SAVE. But under the Project 2025 IDR plan, that family’s payment would be about $156 per month.
Savannah Britt told AP News she owes about $27,000 on loans she took out to attend college at Rutgers University, payments for which are currently on hold while the courts consider challenges to loan forgiveness. As the weeks tick down on Biden’s time in office, she could soon face a monthly payment of up to $250.
“With this new administration, the dream is gone. It’s shot,” said Britt, 30, who runs her own communications agency.
- 3. Reduced enforcement of civil rights law, especially regarding police misconduct
Trump has plans to reorganize the U.S. Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, which enforces federal law regarding anti-discrimination and civil equality in a broad array of cases, including those involving hate crimes, employment and housing discrimination, and voting rights.
One area of concern to civil rights advocates under a second Trump administration is how bias in policing and systematic use-of-force cases will be handled. Such cases are often dependent on the use of consent decrees, which allow federal prosecutors to investigate and uncover evidence of police brutality and racial discrimination in policing, noted Vox.
When unjust practices or misconduct are found, police departments are held to an enforceable set of reforms they are compelled to execute, and their compliance is often monitored for years by the Justice Department.
Consent decrees have been issued in the wake of high-profile police killings that generate public pressure to investigate. The Louisville Police Department was placed under a consent decree following Breonna Taylor’s murder, as were police departments in Baltimore after Freddie Gray’s murder; in Ferguson, Missouri, after Michael Brown’s; and in Minneapolis after George Floyd’s, reported the Vera Institute.
Consent decrees can also be issued in response to long-standing patterns of abuse. The Chicago Police Department has been under a consent decree since 2017 for racially discriminatory policing practices and abuse directed more often at people of color.
The first Trump administration limited the use of such consent decrees, and civil rights advocates are concerned that Trump will roll them back even further, inviting more aggressive, unchecked policing across the country.
Trump’s rhetoric on the campaign trail underscored their concerns. He told a crowd in Erie, Pennsylvania, in October that “one rough hour” of a law enforcement response would tamp down on crime, reported Politico.
“One rough hour, and I mean real rough, the word will get out and it will end immediately,” he said.
Trump also promised he would make local police follow proven methods to get DOJ grants. These methods include using stop-and-frisk, enforcing gun laws strictly, cracking down on illegal drug use, and working with ICE to arrest and deport criminal aliens.
Stop-and-frisk is when a police officer can stop and briefly hold someone they think is doing something illegal. If the officer thinks the person has a weapon, they can pat them down.
The most controversial use of the policy was in New York City, where the stop-and-frisk policy let police stop, question, and search people if they had “reasonable suspicion.” In 2013, a U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York ruled that these tactics violated the 4th Amendment, which protects against unreasonable searches and seizures.
Evidence shows that the policy often targeted Black and Latino citizens, leading to accusations of racial profiling and harassment. Many minorities and civil rights groups, like the Center for Constitutional Rights and the NAACP, strongly opposed the policy.
In 1999, Black and Latino people made up 50% of New York’s population but accounted for 84% of the stops. From 2004 to 2012, the NYPD made 4.4 million stops, with over 80% involving Black and Latino individuals. These stops were less likely to find weapons or contraband on Black and Latino people compared to White people.
- 4. Environmental Protections to be rolled back
Trump’s return to the White House will likely lead to a reduction in the size and effectiveness of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), marked by decentralized regulatory power at the federal level, a pivot toward fossil fuels, and fewer initiatives focused on climate change and environmental justice, according to legal news site JD Supra.
In particular, relaxed pollution standards could result in increased public health problems. As regulations on industrial pollution are reduced, communities near major industrial sites — many of which tend to be low-income, predominantly-Black communities —could experience worsening air, water and other unhealthy environmental conditions.
Environmental justice policy and related civil rights law enforcement have been a priority under the Biden administration but were not in Trump’s first term.
Trump’s administration reversed or significantly altered nearly 100 environmental rules, repealing the Clean Power Plan, rolling back emissions standards for vehicles, and easing restrictions on methane emissions from oil and gas operations.
The Biden administration has made significant headway on restoring environmental regulations slashed by Trump, which Grist has been tracking.
Funding and support for programs aimed at addressing environmental issues in low-income and minority communities could be further scaled back or eliminated in Trump 2.0.
- 5. Reparations for slavery are likely off the table.
While the Biden-Harris administration has supported the idea of a federal commission to study slavery reparations, particularly if driven by an act of Congress, Trump has consistently opposed the idea.
In 2019, former President Trump told The Hill he didn’t see reparations happening at the federal level.
“I think it’s a very unusual thing,” Trump said of the possibility of reparations. “You have a lot of — it’s been a very interesting debate. I don’t see it happening, no.”
More recently, Trump and his campaign mocked Harris for her support of reparations.
In September, Trump posted on X “Kamala’s Project 2025,” a made-up list of policies that included “Ban Fracking,” “Transgender Surgeries for Minors,” and “Taxpayer-Funded Reparations.”
Most Americans are against the idea of reparations for slavery, according to a 2021 Pew Research Center survey. The poll found that 30% of all U.S. adults believe the descendants of enslaved people should be repaid in some fashion, including 77% of Black Americans and 18% of white Americans.
