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Reagan is elected president in a landslide victory over incumbent Jimmy Carter.
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Reagan is sworn in as the 40th president of the United States. On the same day, Iran releases the 52 remaining hostages who had been held at the U.S. embassy in Tehran for 444 days.
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Reagan is shot in the chest upon leaving a Washington hotel but makes a full recovery after surgery. Three other people, including Reagan press secretary James Brady, are wounded in the assassination attempt. John Hinckley Jr. is charged but found not guilty by reason of insanity.
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Reagan appears before Congress for the first time since the assassination attempt. He receives a hero's welcome and overwhelming support for his economic package, which includes cuts in social programs and taxes, and increases in defense spending.
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Congress passes Reagan's tax bill. Instead of a 30% tax cut over three years, Reagan accepts 25%.
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Air traffic controllers go on strike. Reagan gives them 48 hours to get back to work, and fires those who refuse.
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eagan appoints Sandra Day O'Connor as the first female justice on the U.S. Supreme Court.
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Reagan concedes that the United States is in "a slight recession" but predicts recovery by the spring.
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Budget Director David Stockman charges that the 5% economic growth rate that the administration had assumed was a "rosy scenario," and pans "supply side" economics as a way to benefit the rich.
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Reagan unveils his proposal for a Strategic Defense Initiative, later dubbed "Star Wars," in a national speech: "I call upon the scientific community in our country, those who gave us nuclear weapons, to turn their great talents now to the cause of mankind and world peace, to give us the means of rendering these nuclear weapons impotent and obsolete."
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U.S. troops invade Grenada to oust Marxists who had overthrown the government, and to protect U.S. medical students on the Caribbean island.