Several RSF authors and grantees have recently appeared in the press to discuss policy changes that are likely to occur under the incoming Donald Trump administration. While Trump campaigned on a number of populist talking points—including a pledge to “drain the swamp,” or rid the federal government of Washington insiders and other connected elites—over the past few weeks, the president-elect has withdrawn or altered several of these positions. RSF trustee Larry Bartels spoke to the New York Times about the changes, noting that the bulk of Trump’s economic populism has since “fallen by the wayside.” Both he and RSF grantee Jacob Hacker told the Times that they expected Trump’s administration to adopt typical Republican positions, such as supporting large tax cuts and moving to privatize Medicare. As Bartels noted, “The need to work with Republicans in Congress will probably reinforce that shift.”

In an interview with Slate, Mona Lynch, a former Visiting Scholar and author of the new RSF book Hard Bargains: The Coercive Power of Drug Laws in Federal Court, discussed the prospects for sentencing reform under Trump. The appointment of Alabama senator Jeff Sessions as Trump’s attorney general, she argued, could lead to the return of punitive tough-on-crime policies that have exacerbated mass incarceration. Her book documents how the War on Drugs significantly increased the power of federal prosecutors, allowing them to use federal drug laws to coerce guilty pleas and obtain long prison sentences for defendants, particularly those who are African American. While former attorney general Eric Holder had attempted to scale back some of these practices, Lynch told Slate that Sessions was likely to encourage “the return of using a sentence enhancement called the 851 in plea-bargaining on drug cases,” which enables prosecutors to make sentences even longer for drug defendants who have prior drug convictions.

Former Visiting Scholar William Darity spoke to the Atlantic about how a Trump administration might affect the black-white racial wealth gap. Darity noted, “Using incentives like subsidies or tax breaks, Trump seems to intend to pursue a program of intense business expansion in black urban communities.” Yet, while such policies could potentially affect income inequality, Darity argued that they would do little to close the wealth gap. “The major wealth-redistribution measures that will be needed to close the wealth gap also are highly unlikely to be implemented under a Trump regime,” he concluded.

Other RSF authors indicated that there could be ways to hold Trump accountable for the promises to blue-collar workers he made on the campaign trail. In an op-ed for CNBC, Paul Osterman, a former Visiting Scholar and co-author of Good Jobs America, stated, “With pressure from progressives, the president-elect could also be pushed to adopt policies in…skills training, investing in education, and providing support for families.” Similarly, Labor’s Love Lost author Andrew Cherlin told the New York Times that working class families would benefit if Trump’s pledge to create 25 million jobs over the span of a decade came to fruition. “It’s likely if we can improve the job picture for working-class young adults, they’d have family lives that are more stable,” he said.

View the complete list of RSF authors and scholars in the news.