This is a column I’ve been doing for an action group newsletter, and I’m going to start sharing it here on my blog also. Even though conscientious readers will already be aware of the events by the time the list is published, I think it’s helpful to see the full impact of what’s happening in one concise list; and although it’s difficult to limit the list to only 10, these are in my opinion the ones with the greatest impact.
Trump’s Top Ten Travesties, Week 1
During Week 1 of the Twilight Zone “presidency,” #45
- Signed 12 executive actions: 4 executive orders and 8 presidential memoranda.
- Gave the green light to Dakota Access and Keystone pipelines, removing environmental protections put in place by President Obama.
- Reinstated the global “gag rule” which bans U.S. support to foreign organizations that even discuss abortion with their clients.
- Issued a “Border Security” executive order which states that Congress will allot federal funds for the “immediate construction” of a southern border wall.
- Gave the go-ahead for Congress to begin immediately working toward repealing the Affordable Care Act (which, by the way, is the name we should use consistently from now on, since there are many among our citizenry who don’t know that the ACA and Obamacare are the same thing).
- Began managing information output to the public: gag orders on government agencies (Environmental Protection Agency, Department of Transportation, Interior Department, National Institutes of Health, Department of Agriculture, Health and Human Services [which includes the CDC and Food and Drug Administration] and other agencies) and removal of certain topics from the White House website.
- “Signed an executive order Friday that bans Syrians from taking refuge in the United States, halts the U.S.refugee resettlement program for four months and temporarily blocks people from a handful of unnamed countries from entering the U.S. at all.” (Huffington Post) It should also be noted that the ban excludes countries with which Trump has business ties.
- Imposed a federal hiring freeze.
- Lied repeatedly about the size of his inauguration crowd and the fantasy that he lost the popular vote because 3-5 million “illegals” voted for Hillary Clinton and required his press secretary and chief aides to repeat and validate his lie.
- Withdrew the U.S. from the Trans Pacific Partnership.
And as a footnote, Trump became the first president in U.S. history to be widely labeled a pathological liar and who made it necessary for news outlets to form policies regarding how they will respond to his lies and what terminology they will use (“falsehoods,” “misstatements,” “false statements,” “lies,” etc.) when referring to his frequent LIES.