Trump's new take on 250 years of American expansionism

Key developments are emerging from the global stage. Trump's new take on 250 years of American expansionismImage source, Getty ImagesImage caption, An 1811 drawing depicts Louis and Clark's exploration of the American frontierByAnthony Zurcher North America correspondentPublished19 minutes agoIn the 250 years since the US declared its independence from Great Britain, the nation has grown from a sparsely populated collection of settlements scattered along the Atlantic coast into a global power spread over the breadth of a continent and beyond. Starting from the original 13 colonies that covered 430,000 sq miles (1. 1m sq km), its geographic footprint has increased eightfold, to approximately 3.

America's population has undergone a similarly dramatic expansion. In 1790, the year of the first US Census, there were approximately four million Americans, including slaves. By 2025, the US population had grown to 343 million – an 8,475% increase.

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Even though the US today may be all but unrecognisable to the nation's founders 250 years ago, the cultural and political influences in the country would likely be familiar. In hindsight, one can trace many of President Donald Trump's key political promises - limiting immigration, and expanding American power and territory - to the country's earliest distinctions and divisions. Figure caption, What does it mean to be an American in 2026?

America's founders had high hopes for their new nation. Its success, however, was far from guaranteed. Heated debates over slavery, the constitution and the economic and political system created clear fractures among the population.

While the nation nearly doubled in size following the purchase of the Louisiana territory from France in 1803, when the US went to war again with Britain in 1812 it was far from certain that the nation would hold. "Anybody who was looking at the colonies trying to create this nation is saying, all we need to do is stay over here and wait till they tear themselves apart and go back and pick them up," said Heather Cox Richarson, an US history professor at Boston College and author of Letters From an American on Substack. Although America's future in those early years was uncertain, the forces that contributed to the future trajectory of the nation had already been established.

Colin Woodard, director of the Nationhood Lab at Salve Regina University, divides the US into a number of distinct identities, connected to those early fissures:The northern region, which Woodard calls "Yankeeland", is rooted in the early Puritan settlers who fled religious persecution in Europe, with later additions of Germans and Scandinavian settlers helping to solidify a pluralistic outlook. A middle belt, which he terms "Greater Appalachia", was first settled by independent-minded Scots and Irish. Their political outlook, formed in part by their experience with English oppression on the British isles, was much more suspicious of government authority.

The development has drawn wide international attention, with diplomatic circles watching closely.