Donald Trump’s historic election victory has completed the realignment of American politics. The GOP has emerged as the party of the working class, while the Democrats are now the party of financial and cultural elites. Trump won 31 of the 50 states, and his stunning popular vote victory brought the Senate under GOP control and appears to have enabled Republicans to keep control of the House. But to consolidate that political realignment, Trump will have to keep the promises he made to the American people during the campaign. And those promises can be grouped under the broad heading of “America First.” He has effectively pledged to go not abroad in search of monsters to destroy but to be the champion only of America’s liberty. Despite the Democrats and mainstream media’s attempts to portray “America First” as a version of Nazism at home and isolationism  abroad, the American people decisively rejected that narrative. Beginning with Barack Obama, the elite left and neoconservative right sought to convert the word “nationalism” into something dark and dangerous. The Obama-led left understood that nationalism stood in the way of their desire for global governance. Denigrating nationalism was part of what Obama meant when he promised to fundamentally transform America. Recall that one of Obama’s first undertakings in 2009 was to go on an international tour where he apologized for America’s past sins. He also publicly downplayed the notion of American exceptionalism. Part of the left’s strategy here was to persuade Americans that appeals to nationalism were xenophobic, racist, misogynist, intolerant, and un-American. When businessman and entertainment personality Donald Trump entered the political arena in 2015 and embraced nationalism, the left, who previously liked  Trump or at least found him to be tolerable, suddenly vilified him. Trump’s greatest sin in their eyes was that he appealed to the uneducated, unwashed Americans who, in Obama’s words, clung  to their religion and guns. Trump’s audience for his “America First” mutterings were the people that Hillary Clinton called “deplorables” and Joe Biden called  “garbage.” Soon, the Obama-left added the words “white Christian” to “nationalism” in describing dangerous Trump supporters. Many Christians, after all, opposed abortion on demand and favored the overruling of Roe v. Wade, and abortion had by then became sacrosanct for Democrats and the left in general. And Donald Trump in his first term had made the end of Roe possible by appointing constitutionalist Supreme Court Justices. White Christian nationalists became enemies of the state. Exit polls showed that the two most important issues in the 2024 election were the economy/inflation and the crisis at the southern border. Trump repeatedly addressed both of those issues and promised voters he would cut taxes and carry out mass deportations of illegal aliens (especially those with criminal records). Trump said he would remove taxes on tips, overtime pay, and social security benefits. He also promised to lower inflation and restrain government spending. And Trump said he would threaten and use tariffs and penalize American companies who sent manufacturing jobs overseas while incentivizing domestic manufacturing to protect American workers. With a compliant GOP-led Congress, Trump should be able to accomplish some, if not all, of those things. Trump will need to ensure that his tax cuts — as he promised — are targeted first and foremost at the working class. During the 2024 campaign Trump characterized the crisis at our southern border as an “invasion.” He pointed out that many of the illegals that crossed the border were dangerous criminals — an assertion later confirmed by the Biden administration’s Department of Homeland Security. Trump blamed the Biden administration’s open border policies for the crisis, and apparently most voters agreed. Belated attempts to pass a flawed border control bill failed in Congress and the left’s effort to blame Trump for the bill’s defeat was unpersuasive. Trump promised mass deportation of illegals, and polls showed that most voters approved. If Trump was to flip-flop on this issue, he would alienate a sizeable portion of his “America First” supporters. Trump also promised to return the United States to energy dominance by promoting oil exploration, fracking, nuclear power, and renewable energy sources. This issue resonated in states like Pennsylvania — so much so that Kamala Harris flip-flopped on this issue, even though Trump commercials showed her previous remarks in which she promised to end fracking. The “America First” voters don’t want to be forced to drive electric vehicles, and they don’t want their sons and daughters fighting wars in the Middle East to maintain access to foreign energy sources when we have plenty of energy sources at home. The Realist Promise “America First” also has a national security component that supports a more restrained “realist” approach to the world instead of the neoliberal/neoconservative interventionist policies of the past three decades. Trump promised voters that he would end the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, and focus on deterring China in the western Pacific. Trump also wants our European and Asian allies to contribute  more toward their own defense — something that most American presidents supported in the past, and something that also resonates with most Americans. Trump has vowed not to waste American lives and resources fighting peripheral wars to spread democracy throughout the world. Americans have had their fill of costly nation-building efforts. Trump is not, as he is often depicted by the neoliberals and neoconservatives, an isolationist; he is a foreign policy realist in the tradition of George Washington and John Quincy Adams. He has effectively pledged to go not abroad in search of monsters to destroy but to be the champion only of America’s liberty. Whether the Trump-led realignment of the political parties is solidified will depend on how many of these promises Trump will keep. Stay tuned. READ MORE from Francis P. Sempa: Would Bush’s Endorsement Help Harris? 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