(The Daily Signal)—To call 2025 a tumultuous year would be an understatement. It already feels like January was about five years ago, and I expect the rest of President Donald Trump’s second term will move at a similarly breakneck pace.
That said, it helps to take a breather and reflect on what actually happened and what it means for American politics today and in the future.
Without further ado, here are the biggest winners and losers of 2025.
Loser: The Left’s Nonprofit Industrial Complex
The federal government has long contracted with leftist nonprofits in the name of justice or helping other countries, but the funding ballooned in the Biden administration, and the Department of Government Efficiency represented a historic attempt to expose and shatter this ideological piggy bank.
Before DOGE, I investigated the woke groups that infiltrated and advised the Biden administration, and my research uncovered not only that these groups received federal grants but that many of them sued the Trump administration to block his policies—particularly to keep the gravy train flowing. I testified in Congress about this research twice, and the Dao Prize honored me for it by designating me a finalist.
The Trump administration cut off the funding streams for immigration groups that moved illegal aliens across the country. The Environmental Protection Agency clawed back extravagant grants to climate alarmist groups. The State Department shuttered the U.S. Agency for International Development. Congress finally cut off funding for National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting Service.
After Scott Walter and I highlighted the leftist nonprofits that worked with Arabella Advisors, Microsoft founder Bill Gates withdrew his foundation’s entanglement with them, and Arabella Advisors purportedly dissolved, leading to the emergence of new entities.
Contrary to leftist fearmongering, civil society remains strong. Americans remain free to contribute to causes they believe in, we just aren’t being forced to do so with our tax dollars anymore.
Loser: Transgender Ideology
Candidate Trump campaigned on protecting children and bringing back sanity on gender. He has delivered on this promise in spades.
Trump’s executive order declaring the basic truth that human beings are male and female corrected major abuses of the Biden administration.
In May, the Department of Health and Human Services published a review of the science, finding extremely weak evidence for the claim that “sex-rejecting procedures”—grotesque medical interventions that trans activists refer to as “gender-affirming care”—have any positive effects. A peer-review process confirmed this finding and also highlighted why transgender activists seek to silence their opponents, rather than engaging with them.
HHS ended the year by announcing six major policy moves against “sex-rejecting procedures,” which will prevent your tax dollars from funding “treatments” that leave kids stunted, scarred, and infertile.
In June, the Supreme Court upheld Tennessee’s right to protect kids from these procedures.
Loser: The Fourth Branch of Government
The president hasn’t just been cutting back government spending—he’s also paring back the unaccountable bureaucracy.
Trump has cleaned house at federal agencies, and he is now forcing the Supreme Court to consider, once and for all, whether there are parts of the executive branch that fall outside of the president’s control.
While the Constitution clearly vests all executive power in the president, Congress has established so-called independent agencies. In Humphrey’s Executor v. United States (1935), the Supreme Court upheld the Federal Trade Commission as an agency not subject to the president’s Article II authority because it engaged in “quasi-legislative” and “quasi-judicial” functions. Now, the court seems on the verge of rightly reversing that ruling and returning executive power to the people’s elected president.
Winner: Border Security
Former President Joe Biden repeatedly insisted that he needed new laws to address the border crisis, but Trump effectively solved the issue on Day One with executive orders, finally directing the feds to actually enforce the laws on the books.
An estimated 10 million illegal aliens entered the country on Biden’s watch, but border crossings hit record lows this year and remain a tiny fraction of what they were under the former president.
Winner: Trump Peace Deals
Trump has taken credit for ending eight wars.
While his celebration on this might seem premature, Trump has indeed brokered agreements to stop fighting and taken decisive action that ended conflicts.
For example, the brief war between Israel and Iran ended after the U.S. bombed Iranian nuclear sites in a show of force and after Trump urged Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to immediately secure peace with Iran following the strikes.
Although India downplayed Trump’s role in securing peace between New Delhi and its long-time rival Pakistan, the Pakistani prime minister nominated the American president for a Nobel Peace Prize.
Trump achieved a historic ceasefire and hostage release deal between Israel and Hamas this fall, securing the release of the final living Israeli hostages from Hamas.
While the war between Russia and Ukraine rages on, and Trump’s strikes on drug boats off the coast of Venezuela may lead to a conflict, the president can rightly take credit for securing many peace deals.
When the Nobel Committee refused to award Trump the Nobel Peace Prize, the FIFA World Cup awarded him its inaugural peace prize.
Winner: Political Violence
This year saw an alarming increase in political violence, particularly from the Left.
Many on the Left raised money to help the alleged murderer of a health care CEO.
In May, a gunman yelling, “Free Palestine,” shot and killed a Jewish couple outside the National Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C.
In June, a man allegedly murdered former Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman, her husband, and shot state Sen. John Hoffman and his wife, both of whom survived. A few days after the assassination, a Democratic Party lobbyist reportedly sent text messages to a former friend of an opposing political viewpoint. The lobbyist wrote, “Excited to have my gun at the capitol and blow somebody’s f—— face off.”
On Aug. 27, a man who legally changed his name to affirm a transgender identity shot and killed two children and injured thirty others at a school mass at the Church of the Annunciation in Minneapolis.
On Sept. 10, a man in a relationship with another man who identifies as transgender allegedly murdered Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk. Many on the Left celebrated Kirk’s death. A church celebrating Kirk faced an arson attempt, and many Kirk memorials faced vandalism.
Winner: Affordability Messaging
The president has rightly called Democrats’ attempt to blame him for cost-of-living struggles a “con job,” because the root of most recent inflation is the excessive government spending during the COVID-19 pandemic.
That said, “affordability” clearly resonates with voters, and that helps explain the Democrats’ victories in November. Americans want to see lower prices and higher wages, and Vice President JD Vance addressed the issue earlier this month.
Trump’s policies have addressed some drivers of the affordability crisis—such as an all-of-the-above energy strategy that drives down energy prices—and many Americans may look forward to tax cuts in the “One Big, Beautiful Bill.”
Expect affordability to remain a political issue, at least in the near term.
Winner: Conservative Media
Trump opened the White House briefing room to alternative media, including new conservative outlets. While The Daily Signal has long had a presence in the White House, Biden briefly excluded The Daily Signal and other journalists. Trump, by contrast, has opened the briefing room to new outlets, allowing increased transparency.
The Trump administration has also bucked the trend for Washington Republicans. For too long, Republicans in D.C. would go to left-leaning outlets like The New York Times and The Washington Post with exclusive stories, hoping to curry favor. Now, the Trump administration has worked with outlets like The Daily Signal.
My colleague, White House Correspondent Elizabeth Mitchell, has become a scoop machine, and FBI Director Kash Patel gave me the scoop on the bureau swearing off the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Bypass Big Tech Censors
Starting the Day With a Scripture-Inspired Roast Helps Center Your Thoughts on Eternal Truths Amid Temporal Pressures
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