What will Donald Trump do as president? Where the Republican stands on immigration, abortion, tax and more

Republican Donald Trump will become the 47th US president after defeating Democrat Kamala Harris in the election.

The former president, who won the election in 2016 but failed to be re-elected in 2020, will return to the White House when he is sworn in to office in January.

Mr Trump declared he had won his bid to become the next president before most major news channels had called the election. After winning the swing seats of North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Georgia, Mr Trump addressed a crowd in Florida claiming his victory was the "greatest political movement of all time".

READ MORE: What does a Donald Trump win mean for the UK?

It wasn't long before Wisconsin was called for the former president, taking him over the 270 electoral votes needed and sealing his victory.

Mr Trump is the first former president to return to power since Grover Cleveland regained the White House in the 1892 election. He is also the first person convicted of a felony to be elected president and, at 78, is the oldest person elected to the office.

The Republican has plans to enact a sweeping agenda that would transform nearly every aspect of American government. Here we take a look at what Mr Trump has proposed to do as President of the United States and where he stands on key issues.

Immigration

Mr Trump says he wants to create “the largest mass deportation program in history” and has called for using the National Guard and empowering domestic police forces in the effort.

Details of what the programme would look like are yet to emerge but immigration is one of the biggest issues for his supporters so it will be high on the agenda.

Mr Trump has pitched “ideological screening” for would-be entrants and ending birth-right citizenship - a move that would almost certainly require a constitutional change. His approach would not just crack down on illegal migration, but curtail immigration overall.

In his victory speech, he repeatedly mentioned "sealing up" America's borders.

Abortion

Mr Trump played down abortion as a second-term priority, despite taking credit for the Supreme Court ending a woman’s federal right to terminate a pregnancy with the overturning of Roe v Wade, and returning abortion regulation to state governments.

Mr Trump did not call for a national ban on abortion, maintaining that overturning Roe v Wade is enough on the federal level. However, has not said explicitly that he would veto national abortion restrictions if they reached his desk.

And in an example of how the conservative movement might proceed with or without Mr Trump, anti-abortion activists note that the Republican platform still asserts that a foetus should have due process protections under the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause. That constitutional argument could lead to a national abortion ban through the federal courts.

Taxes

Mr Trump’s tax policies broadly tilt toward corporations and wealthier Americans. That is mostly because of his promise to extend his 2017 tax overhaul, with a few notable changes that include lowering the corporate income tax rate to 15 per cent from the current 21 per cent.

That also involves rolling back Democratic President Joe Biden’s income tax hikes on the wealthiest Americans and scrapping Inflation Reduction Act levies that finance energy measures intended to combat climate change.

Those policies notwithstanding, Mr Trump has put more emphasis on new proposals aimed at working and middle class Americans: exempting earned tips, social security wages and overtime wages from income tax.

Tariffs and trade

Mr Trump has proposed tariffs of 10 per cent to 20 per cent on foreign goods and in some speeches has mentioned even higher percentages.

He promises to reinstitute an August 2020 executive order requiring that the Food and Drug Administration buy “essential” medications only from US companies. He pledges to block purchases of “any vital infrastructure” in the US by Chinese buyers.

LGBTQ and civil rights

Mr Trump has called for the rolling back of societal emphasis on diversity and for legal protections for LGBTQ citizens. He has called for an end to diversity, equity and inclusion programmes in government institutions, using federal funding as leverage.

On transgender rights, Mr Trump promises generally to end “boys in girls’ sports”, a practice he says, without evidence, is widespread.

But his policies go well beyond standard applause lines from his rally speeches. Among other ideas, Mr Trump would roll back the Biden administration’s policy of extending Title IX civil rights protections to transgender students, and he would ask Congress to require that only two genders can be recognised at birth.

Social security and health insurance

Mr Trump has said he will protect social security and Medicare, popular programmes geared toward older Americans and among the biggest pieces of the federal spending pie each year.

There are questions about how his proposal not to tax tip and overtime wages might affect social security and Medicare.

If such plans eventually involved only income taxes, the entitlement programmes would not be affected. But exempting those wages from payroll taxes would reduce the funding stream for social security and Medicare outlays.

He has called for repealing the Affordable Care Act and its subsidised health insurance marketplaces. But he still has not proposed a replacement.

Climate and energy

Mr Trump has previously claimed that climate change is a “hoax”. He has criticised Biden-era spending on cleaner energy designed to reduce US reliance on fossil fuels.

He proposes an energy policy and transportation infrastructure spending anchored to fossil fuels: roads, bridges and combustion-engine vehicles. “Drill, baby, drill!” was a regular chant at Trump rallies.

Mr Trump says he does not oppose electric vehicles but promises to end all Biden incentives to encourage EV market development.