Which US president has done the most harm to the United States
Executive summary
Historians and commentators disagree sharply about which U.S. president “did the most harm”; recent rankings and opinion pieces frequently place Donald Trump among the worst, citing threats to democratic norms, policy chaos and alleged corruption (examples: Presidential Greatness Project finds “Trump is the worst”; The New Dealer and Democracy21 call his record highly damaging) [1] [2] [3]. Conservative and international commentators likewise warn his second term poses exceptional dangers to institutions and global standing (The Guardian, Asia Times, Jan‑Werner Müller) [4] [5] [6].
1. Why modern commentators single out Trump
Multiple 2024–25 lists and opinion pieces argue that Donald Trump has inflicted unusually severe damage through assaults on democratic norms, institutional disruption and chaotic policymaking; The New Dealer’s ranking says he “has done more harm than good,” Democracy21 labels him “the worst president in history,” and The Guardian warns his second term is “more lawless and more authoritarian than any in US history” [2] [3] [4].
2. What critics point to as concrete harms
Writers cite a pattern: efforts to weaken oversight and agencies (examples cited in commentaries about dismantling USAID and threats to the Department of Education), inflammatory rhetoric that risks political violence, and foreign‑policy moves that may downgrade U.S. standing and the dollar’s primacy [6] [4]. Asia Times and The Guardian pieces warn of accommodation to authoritarian rivals and trade/tariff policies likened to 1930s isolationism [5] [7].
3. How institutional rankings and surveys treat “harm” vs. “greatness”
Presidential rankings blend achievement, crisis leadership and moral authority; the Presidential Greatness Project’s 2024 survey listed Abraham Lincoln as the best and Donald Trump as the worst, reflecting scholars’ and the public’s composite judgments rather than a single metric of “harm” [1]. Compilations like Factinate synthesize Siena, C‑SPAN and other surveys to create smoothed rankings, showing that conclusions depend on which criteria are prioritized [8].
4. Voices calling the framing of “most harmful” into question
Not all sources are unanimous; ideological outlets and foreign commentators offer divergent emphases. Conservative and international pieces sometimes focus on different failings (economic isolationism, foreign‑policy missteps) rather than the same catalogue of democratic erosion critics emphasize [7] [5]. Some rankings are explicitly subjective—Hungarian Conservative and The New Dealer state their lists reflect editorial or ideological judgments rather than neutral, universal measures [9] [2].
5. The methodological problem: harm is multi‑dimensional
Assessing “most harm” requires choosing among metrics—constitutional norms, economic indicators, casualties of war, long‑term institutional damage, corruption, public health outcomes. The sources show scholars and commentators weigh those dimensions differently: some emphasize alleged coup attempts and impeachments (Democracy21 notes two impeachments and a post‑2020 attempt to overturn results), others emphasize economic nationalism and diplomatic damage [3] [4] [5].
6. What proponents of harsh rankings disclose about their agendas
Several sources are advocacy or opinion‑led: Democracy21 is an oversight advocacy group and The Guardian and Jan‑Werner Müller write polemically about threats to democracy; the Democratic National Committee’s commentary frames presidential evaluations within partisan critique [3] [4] [10]. These outlets aim to persuade readers that institutional or policy harms are existential, and that should be weighed when reading their claims [10].
7. Missing or limited information in current reporting
Available sources do not present a comprehensive, cross‑disciplinary, historian‑led quantitative study that definitively measures “harm” across all presidents (not found in current reporting). They also do not converge on a single, universally accepted methodology to declare one president the single “most harmful” in U.S. history (not found in current reporting).
8. Bottom line for readers seeking a judgement
Recent mainstream and advocacy commentary in 2024–25 increasingly identifies Donald Trump as among the most damaging presidents, citing democratic erosion, policy chaos and institutional attacks; these conclusions appear across multiple outlets (The New Dealer, Democracy21, The Guardian, Presidential Greatness Project) but rest on contested criteria and ideological framing [2] [3] [4] [1]. Readers should weigh the type of evidence each source prioritizes—constitutional norms, economic policy, or corruption—and note that historians’ formal rankings rely on aggregated criteria rather than a single “harm” tally [8].