10 Things That Would Have Happened If Hillary Were President
By: Grady Bolding
Tags: Hillary Clinton, Alternate History, 2016 Election, Democratic Party, Politics

10 Things That Would Have Happened If Hillary Were President

How The World Might Have Looked With An HRC Presidency

Hillary Clinton at a rally in 2016. Courtesy: Timothy A. Clary/AFP via Getty Images.

We have entered the final months of President Donald Trump’s first full-term, and the United States is anything but united.

Since 2016, the nation has been marred by one political earthquake after another, be it impeachment hearings or riots in the streets of Portland— and the next few years don’t look any more promising.

As the voter prepares to cast the ballot this November, many ask how things might have been different had Trump lost the 2016 election?

Rewind to November 2016. Hillary Rodham Clinton wins by a landslide, Donald Trump returns to Trump Towers, and the first female president takes office in a hostile world.

What happens after that?

Some of the judgments below may be on the mark while others may be way off, but one thing is certain — today’s political atmosphere would have been no different under a Hillary Clinton presidency.

Without a doubt.

10. An Internationalist Presidency

In a speech addressed to the American Legion in September 2016, HRC championed her background as former Secretary of State as a qualification for the presidency.

For sure, this diplomatic experience would have been instrumental for her as POTUS. As Dr. Gerlinde Groitl of the University of Regensburg observed:

Her foreign policy ideas rest on the belief that principled leadership and global engagement are vital for the well-being of the U.S. and for the world. She is convinced that the U.S. needs to support freedom and democracy, stand up to aggressors, uphold international order, punish rule-breaking, and enlist partners in multilateral diplomacy.

Unlike the Trump Doctrine, which seeks for the US to act independently of multilateral agreements and institutions, the Hillary Doctrine may have involved a strengthening of alliances to protect US interests abroad (especially where Russia was concerned— more below).

This would have included upholding international deals such as the Paris Climate Accord of 2015 and the Iran nuclear deal — both of which Trump withdrew from early in his administration.

9. US Relations With China Would Have Soured

For some, Donald Trump’s imposition of tariffs on Chinese exports signaled a new era for US-Chinese relations.

However, the dominoes of the US-Sino trade wars started falling under Barack Obama and would have continued to fall under HRC.

In addressing a crowd at a manufacturing plant in Warren, Michigan, HRC expressed the need to utilize “targeted tariffs” on Chinese goods:

So as President, I will stand up to China and anyone else who tries to take advantage of American workers and companies. And I’m going to ramp up enforcement by appointing, for the first time, a chief trade prosecutor, I will triple the number of enforcement officers, and when countries break the rules, we won’t hesitate to impose targeted tariffs.

Writing for The Diplomat, Professor of International Relations at Jinan University Dingding Chen emphasized that an HRC-presidency would have been tense with China due to harsh statements made against the Communist regime in the past.

Along with enduring trade disputes, Beijing still would have pushed for further expansion into the South China Sea and disputed regions bordering India. The US likely would have remained distracted with the North Korea nuclear crisis, as was the case in 2017.

Still, Dingding Chen maintained a hopeful outlook that an HRC presidency might have resulted in a “more mature and healthy bilateral relationship” between Washington DC and Beijing.

8. US-Russia Relations DEFINITELY Would Have Soured

In 2016, Clinton Elrich of Foreign Policy wrote how members of Russia’s leading think tank — the Moscow State Institute of International Relations — were sure that relations with the US would deteriorate in the event of a Hillary presidency.

Among the grievances expressed by the think tank included the US’s neutralization of Muammar Gaddafi, a Russian asset in North Africa, and the proposal for a no-fly zone over Syria, a Russian asset in the Middle East.

Both actions were vehemently supported by Hillary Rodham Clinton in her tenure as Secretary of State — and Putin would not have let either slide.

At the height of the candidacy period in 2016, the New York Times detailed how HRC’s advisors “privately” had an “update of the ‘containment’ strategy” towards Russia, which would have included a “mix of sanctions, diplomatic isolation, and international condemnation.”

Repeated cases of Russian harassment against US military units have persisted since the 2016 election, and given her harsh stance towards Moscow, these numbers might have sharply increased in the event of a Hillary presidency. Likewise, HRC might have committed more troops to eastern Europe as part of the European Deterrence Initiative.

To no surprise, the Senate Committee on Intelligence recently concluded that Russia indeed attempted to influence the outcome of the 2016 election, and for sure, HRC would not have let that slide either.

Even today, her grudge with Putin runs deep, as hinted on pg. 45 of her 2017 memoir, What Happened?:

Many of the organizations wanted the speeches to be private, and I respected that: that they were paying for a unique experience. That allowed me to be candid about my impressions of world leaders who might have been offended if they heard. (I’m talking about you, Vladimir).

7. The Economy Would Have Improved (And A Recession Still Would Have Happened)

In the run-up to the 2016 election, a survey conducted by the National Association for Business Economics showed how 55% of 414 economists favored Hillary in managing economic affairs.

David Wessell, Director of the Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy, outlined Hillary’s economic policy in the Wall Street Journal:

Hillary Clinton clearly favors using the power of government in all respects–taxes, spending, regulation, incentives for states and businesses–to help steer the U.S. economy toward what she considers a better place. That applies to using the tax code to make it harder for companies to move headquarters and jobs overseas and using the government’s regulatory muscle to keep Wall Street from the mistakes and risks that led to the Great Recession.

An HRC presidency likely would have continued said regulatory practices while overseeing the continual uptick in the economy that had been happening for the previous decade.

On the flip side, analysts and economists already sounded the alarm for recession well before the COVID pandemic.

In 2017, geopolitical analyst George Friedman noticed signs of trouble with low interest rates amidst the nation’s economic expansion.

A year later, NYU business professor Nouriel Roubini warned of an impending recession due to growing tensions between the US and foreign rivals (China, Russia, North Korea, and Iran).

In 2019, economist Paul Krugman — in attacking Trump’s tax cuts — warned of the de-acceleration of the eurozone in Europe that could heighten the US’s risk of recession.

As one or all of these factors could have easily happened under HRC (certainly the second one), the economic bubble might have burst in either 2019 or 2020 as it did under Trump, especially with the onset of the COVID crisis.

6. COVID-19 Still Would Have Hit The US Hard

In 2003, the SARS virus broke out in China and spread worldwide. It did not wreak havoc as its COVID offspring would, but as the New England Journal of Medicine explains:

We have recently seen many such emerging zoonoses, including the 2003 bat-coronavirus–derived SARS (an earlier severe acute respiratory syndrome, caused by a closely related coronavirus), which came terrifyingly close to causing a deadly global pandemic that was prevented only by swift global public health actions and luck.

As it stands, the United States was lucky for two decades, and their luck finally ran out in 2019.

Since the COVID outbreak of last November, HRC has regularly slammed Trump for his response to the crisis and insisted she would have done “better” as president.

It’s quite possible that she may have pushed for quicker measures given the previous “playbook” and improvement plans left behind by outgoing administrations. For sure, she would have pushed for one or more stimulus packages to support families across the United States.

Regardless, as fast as the COVID virus spread, lock-downs would have taken effect, and the economy still would have taken the biggest hit.

5. The “Resistance”

Apart from Fox News and Talk Radio, those whom Hillary dubbed “deplorables” would have been ready to strike on Day One of her presidency.

Donald Trump wasn’t even a month into his presidency when he was targeted by the Women’s March. An HRC presidency might have been on the receiving end of a similar march, as seen with the annual March For Life Rally of 2017 (which occurred roughly six days after the Women’s March).

The number of anti-government groups reportedly swelled during the Obama administration, and with unorganized militiamen grabbing headlines even under the Trump administration, an HRC presidency would have added fuel to that fire as well.

However, possibly the most significant push-back would have come from the hard Left. Given her open ties to Wall Street, Silicon Valley, and Hollywood, portions of the anti-corporate Left (including remnants of Occupy Wall Street) would have continually taken to the streets in protest of her Neo-liberal policies.

4. The George Floyd Protests Still Would Have Happened

The US was rattled with protests following the murder of George Floyd in May of 2020, but today’s earthquake was preceded by several tremors.

The names of Trayvon Martin, Eric Garner, and Michael Brown kicked off the Black Lives Matter movement in the 2010s, and it was only inevitable that tensions would hit critical mass at some point.

Prior, HRC frequently tried to paint herself as an ally of the BLM movement. She had a number of exchanges with separate BLM chapters before the 2016 election — some of which did not necessarily help her image.

In August 2015, HRC met with five BLM activists in Keene, NH, who confronted her about her support for the 1994 federal crime bill as First Lady (one of the activists, Daunasia Yancey, openly called HRC’s racial justice record “abysmal” in an NPR interview a week later).

Two months later, during an “African-Americans For Hillary” rally in Atlanta, 10 BLM activists were escorted out after interrupting her speech about criminal justice reform (to which she replied dismissively, “I’m sorry they didn’t listen…”).

By February 2016, Hillary apparently had enough when, after being confronted again in Charleston, SC, she replied to an activist, “Do you want to hear the facts, or do you just want to talk?”

To be sure, an HRC presidency might have been more receptive to the BLM movement’s grievances. She easily won the majority of Black voters in 2016 and has expressed a degree of support for the recent George Floyd protests.

Yet, it is difficult to imagine a genuinely cordial relationship between HRC and the movement, given her frosty responses when confronted over racial relations in the past.

3. Scandals Galore

Even during her time as First Lady, HRC was the subject of numerous scandals (Troopergate, Travelgate, Thankyougate).

A plethora of other “gates” easily awaited her as president — especially in the wake of the #MeToo movement.

This would have included her loose ties to the disgraced Harvey Weinstein, her willingness to shield a campaign staffer accused of sexual harassment, and her marriage to a man with a history of sexual misconduct (not to mention Bill’s friendship with the deceased predator, Jeffrey Epstein).

A smoking gun, however, might have emerged from her philanthropy background.

The Clinton Foundation — founded by herself, her husband Bill, and daughter Chelsea — has received much scrutiny for accepting millions in donations from questionable sources including Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, and a son-in-law of a former Ukrainian president accused of murdering journalists.

In 2017, a number of wealthy donors pulled out from the Clinton Global Initiative following several accusations of conflicts of interest. Among the more interesting pieces of information was an email released by Wikileaks, which suggested the Clintons allegedly sold political favors to wealthy donors, such as Ukrainian businessman Viktor Pinchuk.

While no solid evidence has been found over the matter, episodes like this would have been exploited by HRC’s enemies while in office — and this would have led to an inevitable outcome.

2. Impeachment

Not a single US president since Bill Clinton has escaped the specter of impeachment, and his wife most definitely would not have escaped the stigma either.

Where Trump endured impeachment over a quid pro quo with the Prime Minister of Ukraine, a similar scenario may easily have unfolded given loose ends not tied up in Hillary’s philanthropy background.

Might Hillary have been “locked up” in this case?

As with Donald Trump — and her husband — the partisan atmosphere of Washington DC would have ensured the survival of her tenure. The articles of impeachment against Trump passed the Democratic-controlled House and died in the Republican-controlled Senate. In the case of HRC, any articles might have been killed in the House well before reaching the Senate.

Having survived disputes over Benghazi and her private emails in the past, HRC likely would have survived impeachment with the help of political allies, but she still would have had to answer to the electorate in 2020 — and this would have been a more daunting task.

1. A One-And-Done Presidency

Polls have frequently shown a decline in approval for Hillary Clinton since the 2016 election.

A Gallup Poll from 2017 showed HRC’s popularity with respondents sat at 36%. A year later, the same poll showed the same percentage, which remains the lowest to date for HRC.

Elsewhere, a Morning Consult/Politico poll conducted on August 11th showed 35% of voters had an unfavorable view of today’s Democratic presidential hopeful Joe Biden, which contrasts with Hillary in 2016 at 43%. The same poll showed a striking contrast among Independent voters with 31% viewing Biden unfavorably while, in 2016, this number sat at 51% for HRC.

As polarizing — if not demonizing — a figure as she is, HRC would have faced more enemies at home than abroad.

She would have faced stiff opposition from the Right, which identified her as the face of evil in the Democratic Party since her years as First Lady. Figures like Sean Hannity and Judge Jeanine Pirro would have gleefully turned up the populist pressure against HRC, as they had done under Barack Obama.

Apart from right-wing talking heads on Fox News, online left-wing personalities such as Jimmy Dore, David Pakman, and Kyle Kulinski have been relentless in picking HRC apart — and they have not let anyone forget HRC’s treatment of the Bernie Sanders campaign (which she described on pg. 73 of What Happened? as an “insurgent left-wing candidacy”).

With these odds stacked against her, an HRC presidency may have lasted a single term. She would have been remembered as the COVID-19 president, the impeachment president, and Geoge Floyd president all packaged into one — an honor that has been bestowed upon Trump in her place.

The More Things Change…

Hillary Clinton leaves the stage during the MSNBC Democratic Candidates Debate on February 4, 2016. Courtesy: Jewel Samad/AFP via Getty Images.

Hard as it is to stomach, life under HRC would likely look not much different from today.

The White House would seem less like a Reality Show, but the problems of the world have all been simmering for some time. 2020 was the moment they decided to erupt.

Such a pivotal year has proved trying for the presidency of Donald Trump, and it would have been the exact same under Hillary.

The 2016 election will always be remembered as a battle between “two evils.” As many have learned in the past four years, the “lesser of two evils” is still evil, and we should not have expected less with an HRC presidency.

Nor should we as we enter yet another battle between “two evils.”