it's a tug of war, big business and the mega rich versus the deep state. remarkably, establishment washington has in some ways been rebranded by democrats as firewall against imperial rule.
his administration has made significant progress in reshaping the judiciary, not only with goresuch on the supreme court but in important district court seats. republicans stonewalled obama and refused to vote on many of his court appointments, which left the positions open until trump got elected. now they have the means to fill those roles, which are significant because district courts play a huge role stopping executive orders like the travel ban. if those courts are now headed by conservative judges, they are more likely uphold dubious orders and laws. also, court appointments are important because they are lifetime appointments, so a 45-50 year old conservative judge can influence legislation for decades to come.
foreign policy is the other area of huge change brought about by the administration, with the state department being decimated (many dozens of senior positions unfilled, and mid-level state department workers who are experts in their particular areas being ignored by tillerson and the white house). it can be argued that a less interventionist US is a good thing, but the flipside with the current situation is the US now suffers from a lack of diplomatic interaction with allies as well as adversaries on key issues and an unclear foreign policy in general. as a result, we're seeing china, russia and iran stepping in to fill the void in terms of global trade, syria, etc.
so yeah, the republicans haven't passed any legislation and fumbled some opportunities (like health care), but the impact of a trump administration has hardly been negligible.
