In 2026, Americans will commemorate the 250th anniversary of the independence of the 13 North American colonies, located east of what is now the United States of America.
Taking into account the context of the time, that independence process imposed political projections that can be described as revolutionary, becoming an insurrectionary paradigm against the colonial order established at that time. July 4, 1776, is considered the reference date for the process, 28 years before the other great feat of liberation from European rule in the region, in what is now Haiti. It is therefore the first episode of emancipation on the entire continent.
Of course, it is the principles or postulates of the so-called founding fathers of American independence that generally define the political country we know today as the United States.
Much has happened since then, and those waters have dragged the United States into the quagmire in which it is now mired, increasingly resembling its mother country, the Kingdom of Great Britain, especially when the latter's status as a hegemonic empire collapsed after World War II.
The administration headed by Donald Trump, now in its fifth year of government, seems paradoxically determined to give the final push to the current twilight stage of the empire, even though its role was supposed to be just the opposite: to save what remains, including imperial control, at least in its immediate geographical area, referred to by José Martí as Our America.
It is relatively easy to compare what George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Benjamin Franklin said and established at the time with what the 47th president, Donald J. Trump, is doing now.
And it is not a matter of overlooking the changes that come with the dialectic of history; but, obviously, certain principles are there to be respected. Beyond the circumstances, it is basic political ethics, and in practice, they even form the legal and constitutional body that governs the U.S. political system.
Reviewing these contrasts case by case, the independence fighters established as values what they called "individual liberty," according to which every citizen should enjoy inalienable natural rights, such as life; "political equality," which means that men were equal before the law, no one above others, regardless of the size of their income; and "justice and legality," creating a system of laws to supposedly protect citizens from abuses of power. Finally, they established what they called "national unity," seeking to unite the 13 colonies into a single independent nation.
To implement these values, a socio-political system was designed that, among other things, provided for "popular sovereignty," meaning that power emanates from the people and not from a monarch; a "representative government" elected by the citizens; and "separation of powers," that is, the division between the executive, legislative, and judicial branches.
Since then, "federalism" has been established, which entails a balance between the central government and the states, guaranteeing local autonomy. Subsequently, the so-called Bill of Rights was passed, ensuring freedoms such as freedom of speech, religion, and the press.
Well, as previously indicated, Trump has taken it upon himself to challenge or directly dismantle this framework. Some think that he is doing so at his own risk, and there are even well-founded opinions that speak of the president's growing cognitive decline. It is impossible to know at this point whether or not the president is truly insane; what does seem quite clear is that the imperial system requires someone like Trump, precisely to dismantle or, rather, to seek an alternative to the largely outdated, almost useless political model for dealing with the socioeconomic contradictions inherent in capitalism in its current stage.
The mission of the White House tenant is clear: to do what he must to guarantee the privileges of those who rule that country.
From there, with Trump, or through him, the U.S. is moving towards a political system in which the values and principles established in the Constitution by the independence movement are increasingly less respected. The President himself, with his proverbial cynicism, admits that these are times when a dictator is needed; and, well, who better than him, he insists.
Some examples are so obvious that they need no further explanation. Starting with respect for life, the most vital of the so-called individual freedoms, dramatically violated by federal police structures such as the so-called border patrol, also known as ICE or Trump's Gestapo, which, deployed throughout almost the entire country, acts without limits and with impunity hundreds of kilometers from the aforementioned territorial boundaries.
From September 2025 to last Saturday, January 24, ICE henchmen have killed or injured at least 12 U.S. citizens in Illinois, Chicago, Los Angeles, Phoenix, California, Texas, Maryland, Minneapolis, and Oregon. As for immigrants, there have been numerous deaths in captivity, as well as hundreds humiliated in multiple ways, which is another way of annihilating them, they say, including children under two and five years of age, the latter cases already iconic of this repressive rampage.
The blatant violation of the separation of powers is another distinctive feature of an executive branch that disregards the functions and role of Congress, or rhetorically attacks—and also with concrete actions—the independence of the judicial system, with a whiff of political vendetta, or applied against opponents in the best style of any tyranny.
Added to all this are episodes in which the Trumpist narrative, or even administrative actions, seek to curtail the famous freedom of the press—which never existed, but now not even appearances are maintained—or worse, because of the implicit dangers, what the founders called national unity, attacked to the extent that the national government challenges federalism. Trump even threatens to invoke the Insurrection Act of 1807, a we see the Pentagon attacking the U.S., in a climate dominated by permanently irritated, aggressive official rhetoric, full of threats for any reason whatsoever.
And if this analysis is applied to the domestic impact of Trump's foreign policy, it practically seems like a glossary, implemented with brazenness, of the opposite of what the founders of the U.S. had in mind. This can be seen in issues such as exacerbating the supposed American exceptionalism; also in ridiculing original moral foundations, such as when the White House states that it is no longer so interested in democracy and human rights, but rather in oil (Venezuela). Behind all this is the "super" Secretary of State Marco Rubio, not to be forgotten when the reckoning comes in the future.
A treatise could be written on the empire's international actions and, in any case, perhaps in this respect they are faithful followers of those who succeeded the founding fathers, who left behind doctrines such as those of a certain Monroe to be updated now, or gave free rein to endless wars of conquest, spilling blood and mud from every pore; which add up, with the U.S. invasions after World War II alone, no fewer than 26,000,000 people turned into collateral damage.
The American people deserve respect; it is their right to celebrate such a significant date with a minimum of peace and prosperity. But in its twilight years, the system has drifted into a structure that increasingly only works for a very few hyper-billionaires. As things stand, it seems that another revolution like that of July 1776 is needed, updated for these times. Trump, without meaning to, is, in the worst possible way, suggesting this radical solution to so many accumulated contradictions and frustrations. Greetings on the 250th anniversary of independence in the turbulent and brutal north that despises us.
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