Jacob Duran
Professor Mark Copelovitch speaks about President Trump's first 100 days on Monday at Memorial Union. February 24, 2025.
UW professor of political science and public affairs Mark Copelovitch gave a presentation about the first 100 days of President Donald Trump’s presidency at an event hosted at Memorial Union by the Wisconsin Union Directorate Society and Politics Committee.
Copelovitch began the presentation by addressing Trump’s government agency funding cuts and the laying off of federal workers, which he called a “constitutional crisis.”
Thousands of federal government employees have been laid off in efforts led by the Department of Government Efficiency in the first month of Trump’s presidency, according to the Associated Press.
Trump appointed Tesla Motors and SpaceX CEO and his senior advisor Elon Musk to lead the DOGE, hoping to make changes to the federal bureaucracy, according to a post-election statement.
Copelovitch said the current state of American democracy seems to be violating the institutions of the American government.
“We are in an era of partisan polarization now, where the Republican Congress is not reigning in the Republican president, and so the only mechanism left — if you don’t have impeachment — is the next election,” Copelovitch said.
Copelovitch explained Trump’s foreign policy has threatened to seize the territory of two NATO allies — Canada and Greenland (Denmark).
This has created foreign tensions due to the breaking of global commitments, Copelovitch said.
“If you watched the Four Nations ice hockey tournament this last week, the U.S. national anthem does not tend to get booed in Canadian hockey arenas … but that happened,” Copelovitch said.
These threats to the territorial sovereignty of NATO allies along with the reversal of U.S. support for Ukraine have posed high tensions to foreign relations, according to Copelovitch.
Trump’s growing criticism of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has created a rift within the Republican party, as many traditional conservatives continue to defend Zelenskyy, according to NBC News.
This has created conflict in both national and foreign relations, Copelovitch said.
“We don’t really know what four years of Trump will really look like,” Copelovitch said. “Are we moving into unprecedented times or will the fundamentals of American democracy reassert themselves?”
Copelovitch concluded his presentation by drawing on the uncertainty surrounding the future of American democracy under Trump’s leadership.
The evolving state of American democracy marked by political polarization and foreign relations, will continue to shape the trajectory of the country as Trump’s presidential term continues, according to Copelovitch.