Donald Trump is a master at disrupting stale bipartisan orthodoxies and remaking the politics of familiar issues. He did so with free trade and industrial policy in his first term, forcing even the Biden administration to adopt his views. This time around, his tough stance on the border, which helped him win in November, may form the next consensus. America’s mental-health crisis — recently highlighted by a string of horrific attacks in the New York subway system — presents another such opportunity.
That crisis consists of the four million or so adults with untreated serious mental illnesses, such as bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. The result is homelessness, mass shootings, random subway violence, and incarceration, especially in Democratic areas that shifted sharply to the Right in the 2024 election. Trump can disrupt and realign the status quo — provided he ignores small-government zealots in his own camp.
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Stephen Eide is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. He is a 2024-25 public scholar at the City College of New York’s Moynihan Center.
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