Trump's rank among the presidents

[alfred russel]

He doesn't belong in the listing, because he didn't actually act as a president.

[Zanza]

He damaged the American republic, democratic norms and the international rules-based order on top of being an obscene person. Worst president in living memory at least.

[DGuller]

I would put him even below Buchanan, only because of the cards that were dealt.  Buchanan already got a country on the verge of the civil war, Trump didn't but may very well have ensured that Biden would.

[Razgovory]

It's a bit too early to judge, we don't know what kind of effects his presidency will have 10 years down the line.


Personally, I think the all the post cold war presidents will be viewed poorly.

[Malthus]

I would put him even below Buchanan, only because of the cards that were dealt.  Buchanan already got a country on the verge of the civil war, Trump didn't but may very well have ensured that Biden would.

Fair point.

It would have been so easy for Trump to come out pretty well historically, despite being a garbage person, simply by treating the Covid epidemic seriously and allowing the professionals to deal with it, allowing the professionals to deal with international affairs, etc. In short, by doing nothing much.

[alfred russel]

I would put him even below Buchanan, only because of the cards that were dealt.  Buchanan already got a country on the verge of the civil war, Trump didn't but may very well have ensured that Biden would.

The 1850s leading to the ACW...Fillmore, Pierce, then Buchanan.

We just had Trump, and elected a 77 year old clearly past his prime and gave him a totally dysfunctional congressional arrangement. Who can complete the trifecta this time?

[Duque de Bragança]

Older, vain, meticulous coiffed barneg - he's clearly Pompey

Trump did not defeat pirates. 

[Barrister]

He's definitely down in the lowest tier with Andrew Johnson and Warren Harding.

Harding isn't nearly as bad as people think and certainly belongs nowhere near the same tier as Nixon and Buchanan.

Nixon clearly broke the law and deserved to be impeached - but I thought that in general his presidency has been viewed as fairly successful.  He ended the war in Vietnam, recognized China, signed arms control agreements, formed the EPA.  Clearly Watergate brings down his overall ranking but he's got to be at least solidly middle of the pack.

As for Trump, he kept the US out of any disastrous wars and avoided outright genocide so he's not in the absolute worst tier, but obviously he's pretty far down the list.  I'll vote 35-39.

[Sheilbh]

Nixon clearly broke the law and deserved to be impeached - but I thought that in general his presidency has been viewed as fairly successful.  He ended the war in Vietnam, recognized China, signed arms control agreements, formed the EPA.  Clearly Watergate brings down his overall ranking but he's got to be at least solidly middle of the pack.

Although candidate Nixon got the Vietnam war to last longer than it otherwise would have. And in the meanwhile he escalated Vietnam quite significantly which resulted in a lot more deaths of Cambodians, Vietnamese, Laotians (and Americans) but ultimately didn't achieve any of his strategic goals in Vietnam and it's not clear that the extra years of war ever would have achieved those goals. They were probably more or less futile.

I give you China and the EPA. I'm not sure ending Vietnam or detente are necessarily successes.

And I think breaking the law and being forced out of office, regardless of your policy successes, probably mean you fail on other relevant bits of being a President like leaving the office/American Republic at least as healthy as you found it and integrity.

As for Trump, he kept the US out of any disastrous wars and avoided outright genocide so he's not in the absolute worst tier, but obviously he's pretty far down the list.  I'll vote 35-39.

One of the worst mortality rates in a global pandemic with, by the end I imagine, over quarter a million dead.

We have been lucky that there haven't been many crises in the last 4 years - no 9/11 or 2008 style crash. But the single crisis Trump had to handle, he handled catastrophically.

[The Larch]

Two surveys were performed amongst historians during Trump's presidency and he ranked 44th and 42nd, and that was before Covid. Unless there's a massive reevaluation of his presidency in the future he's bound to be a bottom 5 president for a really long time.

[Grey Fox]

Two surveys were performed amongst historians during Trump's presidency and he ranked 44th and 42nd, and that was before Covid. Unless there's a massive reevaluation of his presidency in the future he's bound to be a bottom 5 president for a really long time.

Historian over value every pre-civil war presidency. There's, maybe, 10 good presidency in the history of the USA.

[Josquius]

Two surveys were performed amongst historians during Trump's presidency and he ranked 44th and 42nd, and that was before Covid. Unless there's a massive reevaluation of his presidency in the future he's bound to be a bottom 5 president for a really long time.

To be fair, its pretty common in best/worst X ever lists that the latest flavour of the month performs particularly well.
That its amongst historians I guess is a bit of a saving grace though. Got a link to this?

[Sheilbh]

Although historians are as guilty of that as anyone and you can see a well-argued revisionist take bumping up Presidents even (maybe especially) among historians. We've seen it with Truman, Adams and LBJ.

Edit: And, of course, Nixon.

[Richard Hakluyt]

I wonder how much his ranking would have improved if he had behaved with some degree of dignity? I suppose his crass behaviour is inseparable from his foreign policy failures though.

[Barrister]

Here's a wiki page with a bunch of different rankings of the Presidents.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_rankings_of_presidents_of_the_United_States