Crisis Solar Returns for the U.S.
Crisis Solar Returns for the U.S.
Donald Trump’s 2020 Solar Return
June 2020
President Trump turned 74 on June 14th. His solar return set up for the coordinates of the White House is shown below (see figure 1). It has some good elements: the solar Moon is sextile Venus (0° 38’), solar Jupiter is opposite natal Venus (1° 00’), although—Jupiter is in its fall in Capricorn—and Uranus is angular in the midheaven. So he has immediately gone into campaign overdrive since this solar return began. His base still loves him, signified mostly by Moon sextile Venus. Jupiter opposite his natal Venus is suggestive of both the intensity and the scale of the endeavor that he has set for himself with the same fervor of a man in love, even though at the moment he is far behind his opponent in every poll. Uranus at the midheaven suggests unorthodox methods to achieve his goal of a second term. Perhaps most important, especially with regard to health, he has the solar return Jupiter mundane square the Moon in the solar return. It cannot be seen in the zodiac because mundane aspects often have no standard zodiacal relationship. Aspects in mundo represent simultaneous angularity. The Moon culminated when Jupiter set only 52 seconds beyond the exact to the second contact. Aspects in mundo are quite potent.
The symbolism arrayed against Mr. Trump is not less formidable: transiting Pluto will oppose his natal Saturn for the entire birthday-to-birthday year; transiting Pluto will be quincunx his natal Sun, also for the entire birthday-to-birthday year (exact to the minute on July 3rd and Christmas day 2020); and Pluto will also oppose his natal Venus throughout the birthday-to-birthday year just begun (exact on April 18, 2021, May 7, 2021 and January 27, 2022). Pluto working on those three bodies will expose his every failing and transgression to the light of day; but it is not necessarily the kiss of death in elections. Sometimes people win with transiting Pluto to the natal Sun, but it is already a profoundly awkward and revealing transit as the latest books and defections attest.
Transiting Saturn will be in and out of a quincunx to Trump’s natal Mars throughout 2020 (exact February 26, August 1 and November 24). Saturn to the natal Mars puts a brake on the ability of the native to advance his agenda, whereas Mars to the natal Saturn is more often an outright attack. Everything is slowed and rendered more difficult by Saturn to the natal Mars. The contact is best for precision work, not a free-wheeling campaign effort. Solar Saturn in the sixth house to the natal Mars in the first house of the solar return suggest that health issues come to the fore.
Transiting Saturn will oppose the president’s natal Venus throughout 2020 (exact February 16, August 16 and November 10). This inclines toward loss of popularity, emotional hardship, depression and rejection, but it too is not a factor that is impossible to overcome, although it is hard to work against, because one must become inured to one’s feelings.
Neptune begins the solar return year applying to the square of the president’s natal Moon only 1° 17’ from exact. That square becomes exact to the minute on April 25, 2021, so it is in play throughout his entire seventy-fourth year. That transit works against robust health and frequently relates to excessive use of drugs. It weakens not only vitality but erodes judgment and makes the native lose touch with his milieu. When Neptune makes the exact square to the natal Moon in April next year it will be only 1° 38’ short of the exact square to the natal Sun. Therefore the two most important bodies in the horoscope, the lights, are afflicted by Neptune, and what is worse, Mars is conjoined to Neptune in the solar return. Moreover the Mars-Neptune conjunction is the closest aspect in the chart. Solar Mars sets at the White House when 5h 14m 23s of sidereal time is in the midheaven; solar Neptune sets at Washington when 5h 13m 35s of sidereal time is in the M.C. The difference, 48 seconds of time, is less than ¼° of arc. Mars-Neptune in combination is typically a difficult transit that can symbolize cardiac issues when it is square the Sun. It suggest being undermined from within, which is why it commonly symbolizes infection. It is generally a deleterious combination when it becomes involved with the lights. Strange to say Mars-Neptune in the presence of several auspicious bodies in a natal chart does produce a good fashion sense and it’s sexually adventurous, but somewhat inclined toward the dark side.
The question is when will it operate? Overwhelmingly planets manifest most powerfully when they become angular in the natal chart, a cyclic chart like a solar or lunar return, or a direction, via primary or secondary directions. The solar return, because it is so powerful and near, falls readily to hand. The Mars-Neptune conjunction is in the eighth house and thus cannot operate immediately since it’s thirty-five degrees above the horizon. One can’t merely count the degrees between the descendant and the Mars-Neptune conjunction because Cancer, the rising sign in this solar return, is a sign of long ascension. It takes Cancer just barely less than 2½ hours to rise at the latitude of Washington D.C. and Leo takes even longer. Since the angles of a horoscope are reckoned in right ascension anyway, it makes sense to address the matter of when the Mars-Neptune conjunction will be brought to the descendant of the solar return in right ascension. The issue is only a matter of arithmetic. From the speculum of the 2020 solar return (see figure 2),
Solar Mars sets when the midheaven holds: 5h 14m 23s
Subtract the local sidereal time of the solar return: 2h 23m 20s
Difference: 2h 51m 03s
In other words, 2h 51m 03 of sidereal time passes over the solar return midheaven between the moment it becomes operational, when the local sidereal time is 2h 23m 20s, and when Mars sets on the Washington D.C. horizon. To determine what day that corresponds to, add that difference just determined to the value of the right ascension of the apparent Sun at the inception of the sidereal solar return thus,
RAAS of the SSR: 5h 33m 41s
Add elapsed sidereal time to Mars setting: 2h 51m 03s
RAAS for Mars setting: 8h 24m 44s
Then consult an ephemeris to note that the RAAS will be 8h 23m 08s at O hours GMT on July 26, 2020, therefore 8h 24m 44s by simple interpolation, corresponds to about 9:30 am GMT or 10:30 am British Summer Time, which is shortly before dawn in terms of EDT at Washington D.C.
Solar Neptune sets 48 seconds of sidereal time before Mars, which is almost five hours earlier. Therefore, I think Donald Trump is likely to endure a health issue that is sufficiently serious that it will not be possible to keep it under wraps; and that it will manifest between 1:00 am and 6:00 am EDT on July 26, 2020 if he is in Washington then. Because he has the solar return Moon closely mundane square Jupiter in the solar return itself, I think he will survive, because Moon-Jupiter as a combination is, among other things, protective. July 26th is further underscored by the transit of Mars sesquiquadrate the natal ascendant in the late evening of that day (the 26th). It is angularity, however, more than aspects to an angle, that makes things stand out. Without a direction of the angles to a planet, simple transits often don’t register in a manner that is obvious beyond the immediate purview of the native.
If he is not in Washington on July 26, which is a Sunday, he catches Mars directed to an angle in the Demi-Anlunar of July 25. The descendant of that chart is directed to Mars on July 27th. Saturn rises in the demi-lunar return of July 17 on July 28th. You don’t want to see a confluence of malefics in cyclic charts because it often signifies that the native is ill.
The reason that the Mars-Neptune direction to the descendant is so noteworthy is that it is reflected in the lunar charts that cover the same period, which magnifies the significance of the period.
© Kenneth Bowser, 2020, all rights reserved.
Figure 1: Donald Trump's Solar Return
Figure 2: Trump's Solar Return Speculum
