January 21 will mark the end of Donald Trump's U.S. presidency, scarred in its last year by the turmoil of the pandemic, an economic recession and a tumultuous and disputed presidential election.

As Trump gets closer to the end of his tenure, the U.S. is preparing for a presidential transition unlike any other in the history of the country. Amid controversial last-minute pardons and federal executions, a veto on a defence bill then overridden by the Senate and meeting with QAnon influencers, Trump certainly isn't leaving the office quietly. 

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While his die-hard supporters remain faithful to the outgoing president and plan to stage a mass-scale protest in Washington DC on January 6, when the U.S. Congress will meet to count the Electoral College votes and ratify Joe Biden's electoral victory, America is wondering what sort of legacy Donald Trump will leave the country.

"I think the experiment of Trumpism, unfortunately, was a failure," says Anthony Scaramucci, appointed Communications Director for President Trump in July 2017. He kept the title for just 10 days: not long after taking the job he launched a strongly worded attack against members of Trump's administration and was soon ousted.

Popularly known as 'The Mooch', the former Wall Street executive and founder of the global hedge fund SkyBridge Capital initially remained loyal to Trump, but later radically changed his opinion on the president, as documented by a heated Twitter fight between the two back in 2019.

Today, Scaramucci is very critical of Trump and the impact of his four-year presidency on the country. 

"He had a great opportunity to be a transformative figure and a post-partisan president," he tells CGTN. "But, you know, he mishandled the pandemic. He wrecked the U.S. economy. He weakened our alliances around the world for some irrational reason, or perhaps rational to him, but certainly not rational in the interests of the United States. Praised despots, denigrated democratic leaders. 

"His legacy will be one where he made the United States weaker, sicker and poorer in his presidency. And hopefully people will remember that and he'll be part of the past by January 21."

But Scaramucci is positive that, despite 2020 being a disastrous year for the economy, the time for recovery is coming, and will leave the Trump administration behind entirely.

"I think the market's already moved on, you know, I think the market rallied off the notion of a Biden presidency," he says. 

"I think the market is looking for less volatility, perhaps little to no tweeting from the incoming president. And I think that the market, myself included, likes [that] sort of predictability and likes that sort of stasis."

Back to the Roaring Twenties

Scaramucci compares the current situation with the ones presented by the 1918 pandemic in the U.S., which was followed by the so-called 'Roaring Twenties' – a decade of major technological developments and an outburst of consumerism in the country.

"You're sitting here about to enter 2021 and you have a very similar construct," says Scaramucci. 

"You have pent-up consumer demand. You've got robust liquidity in the markets from the central bank, and you've got the introduction and potential integration of 5G artificial intelligence, driverless cars."

These technological breakthroughs will positively impact the global economy, Scaramucci says.

"So the big dilemma we're going to have is from a policy perspective, how do we deepen that wealth and how do we deepen that economic rent across demography and make sure that it's not held by a very small group of people at the top?

"We have to figure out a way to make it market-based. We have to figure out a way to sort of heal the divide. And hopefully we can do that."

Video editor: Riaz Jugon