On Thursday, January 29th, the Miller Center gathered a panel of experts to discuss the first year of President Trump’s second term. The event, titled “Trump’s second First Year: What worked? What didn’t?”, was hosted online due to inclement weather. Panelists included Everett Eissenstat and Chris Lu, who are both James R. Schlesinger Distinguished Professors at the Miller Center, and Kathryn Dunn Tenpas, a Miller Center practitioner senior fellow. The conversation was moderated by Miller Center Director and CEO William Antholis.
Antholis opened the conversation by discussing the 50-year history of the Miller Center and its various programs for presidential scholarship. Referencing an ongoing project dedicated to presidents’ first years, he explained that the Miller Center seeks to understand why “presidents are more powerful, more partisan, and less popular.” He noted the significance of this particular year, as President Trump is only the second president in American history to have a “second first year,” and then asked each panelist for opening remarks and a “headline.”
Eissenstat served in the first Trump White House as deputy assistant for international affairs and deputy director of the National Economic Council, following years of work in the US House and Senate and the Office of the US Trade Representative. Comparing the first year of Trump’s first and second terms, Eissenstat sees consistency in areas such as immigration, reshoring, deregulation, tax relief, and pushing allies on defense matters. What has changed, however, are the tactics used; Trump’s current administration has thoroughly studied the government, and it is using aggressive measures “designed to increase and expand the powers of the executive branch.” In his one-sentence headline, Eissenstat expressed, “This is an unprecedented test of executive power, and in many ways it’s going to set a new benchmark of executive power.” Therefore, it’s important to analyze the procedures and tactics being used to implement policy.
Lu’s public service career has spanned all three branches of the federal government and two Democratic administrations; he worked as President Biden’s US ambassador to the United Nations for management and reform, US deputy secretary of labor in President Obama’s second term, and White House cabinet secretary and assistant to the president between 2009 and 2013. His headline was succinct: “Because he can.” Across the board, Trump has acted not because Congress authorized it, not because the courts agreed, and not because it was legal, but because nobody stopped him along the way. Lu sees Project 2025 and the “ruthless” ways in which it was implemented as constantly testing and destroying existing guardrails, with the demolition of the East Wing serving as a particularly resonant and symbolic moment. He referenced the overriding norm of presidential restraint, which goes back to the time George Washington chose not to serve a third term, and its importance “even when you have the power to act.”
Tenpas is the director of the Initiative on Improving Interbranch Relations and Government, a visiting fellow with governance studies at the Brookings Institution, and an advisory board member for the White House Transition Project. Analyzing Trump’s second first year from a personnel angle, she offered the headline, “Learning curve plateaus.” She recognized three ways in which the Trump team learned from 2017 and has grown since then. First, there was a different preparation: between 2021 and 2025, an independent organization of Trump loyalists and first-term staffers planned for the possibility of a second Trump administration. Tenpas noted that despite the differences between the first years, one similarity is Trump’s unwillingness to comply with the Government Accountability Office. Furthermore, their new political strategy is based on loyalty, and they have successfully identified individuals who are completely devoted to Trump. Finally, the President appears to be more tempered than in 2017; there have been no public firings on social media, in stark contrast to the first Trump term. Tenpas believes this is largely a function of the loyalty emphasis, leading to a more homogenous set of White House staffers.
After the initial introductions and headlines, panelists took turns responding to questions posed by Antholis. First, they discussed emergency powers and the ways Trump has bypassed guardrails to move quickly and aggressively. Eissenstat was particularly concerned with the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (“IEEPA”) and its role in Trump’s tariffs. He believes that the upcoming Supreme Court ruling will have a serious impact on international economic policy for decades to come. Lu looked at emergency powers throughout history, but cited a key difference between Trump today and cases such as President Lincoln in the Civil War or President Bush following the September 11th Attacks: in past crises, changes enacted by emergency powers were seen as temporary — not meant to be a governing strategy, as they are today. Lu expressed concern about the future of congressional powers after they are “given away.” Pivoting to Congress, Tenpas revealed that in September, Senate Republicans changed a chamber rule to allow them to pass bundles of executive nominations, speeding up the typically individualized process. She referred to three “big beautiful bundles” that were passed between September 10th and the end of December 2025, accounting for more than 60% of all confirmations in Trump’s first year.
Following Antholis’s questions, viewers asked the experts about potential impacts of the current Supreme Court, the Insurrection Act, the “normalization of deviance” — referring to a societal desensitization to extreme presidential behavior — and Congress. The speakers concluded the event with a 30-second “shot clock.” Antholis asked what each was looking for in Trump’s second year, and what advice he or she would offer the President. Tenpas stated that he should focus on personnel. Although the first year has passed, many positions remain open, and “if you want to make headway on your platform, you need to get your people in order.” Lu said he would urge the President to protect NATO. “Unpredictability is good with our adversaries, but not with our allies,” he explained. NATO is the strongest military alliance in the history of the world and keeps America safe at a fraction of the cost. Finally, Eissenstat stressed the importance of durability, as how the courts rule and what Congress does in this term will remain relevant for years to come.
The conversation was lively, and viewers benefited from the wide range of career experiences represented on the panel. Bridging political differences, each speaker discussed the importance of the precedent President Trump set in his second first year, and how that will affect the rest of his term and future administrations.
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